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The  Spirit  of  Labor 


'J'V  II  pi-^^-^^ 


The 
Spirit  of  Labor 


By 

HUTCHINS   HAPGOOD 

Author  of  '^The  Autobiography  of  a  T7uef" 


NEW  YORK 
DUFFIELD    &    COMPANY 

1907 


Copyright,  1907,  by 
DUFFIELD  &  COMPANY 


Published  February,  i^O^ 


The  Trow  Press,  N.  Y. 


TO  MY  FATHER 


CONTENTS. 

Chapter  Pac« 

Preface 9 

I.    Early  Youth        23 

II.    On  the  Road 35 

III.  Injustice  and  Love         54 

IV.  The  Age  of  Reason        75 

V.    Trade-Unionist    . 94 

VI.  Meeting  the  Employer       .     .     .     .119 

VII.    The  Radicals 138 

VIII.     Organizer        167 

IX.  Delegate  to  New  York        .     .     .     .189 

X.  Chicago  Spirit  and  Its  Cause         .     .210 

XI.    Social  Amenities 220 

XII.  Argument  With  Boss     .     .     .     .     .  235 

XIII.  An  Anarchist  Salon 262 

XIV.  Politics  in  the  Federation        .     .     .  293 
XV.  The  Intellectual  Proletariat     .     .  323 

XVI.    Some  of  the  Big  Men 348 

XVII.  Their  Points  of  View       ....  375 

XVIII.    A  Ripe  Letter 401 

[7] 


Preface. 

On  and  off  for  eight  months  I  looked  about 
in  Chicago,  for  a  man.  I  was  more  fortunate 
than  Diogenes,  for  I  found  a  great  many  of 
them.  But  it  was  a  long  time  before  I  discov- 
ered the  one  I  was  looking  for,  and  when  I 
finally  laid  hands  on  him,  I  found  him  other, 
though  far  more  interesting,  than  what  I  had, 
like  the  German  metaphysician,  evolved  from 
my  inner  consciousness. 

I  had  had  several  previous  experiences 
with  the  "human  document" ;  and  had,  in  jour- 
nalistic and  literary  experiments,  attempted  to 
present  my  material  in  such  a  way  that  the 
type  and  the  individual  should  be  at  once  por- 
trayed. For  this  purpose  the  autobiography 
seemed  the  best  form.  In  that  way,  a  whole 
class  with  its  ideals  and  conditions  might  be 
expressed,  and  at  the  same  time  a  definite  per- 

[9] 


Preface. 

sonality  vividly  and  sympathetically  pre- 
sented; the  man  and  his  environment  could 
thus  speak  for  themselves. 

This  method  seemed  to  work  very  well  as  a 
means  of  expressing  the  world  of  crime,  the 
world  of  the  stage,  or  any  milieu  not  too  com- 
plicated and  not  too  important.  In  my  "Au- 
tobiography of  a  Thief,"  the  simple  story,  in 
the  first  person,  of  a  pickpocket's  life,  seemed 
sufficient  to  give  the  reader  a  fairly  complete 
idea  of  the  manners,  customs  and  mental  habits 
of  the  professional  criminal.  The  material  of 
professional  crime  is  picturesque,  in  that  it  is 
exceptional  and  comparatively  unfamiliar. 
It  is  also  limited  in  scope.  For  all  these  rea- 
sons, the  very  definite  manner  of  the  autobi- 
ography is  a  vivid,  central  and  adequate  form 
for  the  artistic  expression  of  this  material. 

But  when  I  became  interested  in  the  labor- 
er, I  found  the  problem  a  very  different  one. 
At  first,  indeed,  I  thought  the  form  of  the 
autobiography  would  be  sufficient  to  suggest 
the  world  of  the  workingman.     I  imagined 

[ID] 


Preface. 

that  I  should  be  able  to  find  a  man  who  would 
occupy  a  sufficiently  typical  position  and  who 
would  be  sufficiently  expressive  to  enable  me 
to  convey,  merely  by  telling  his  story,  as  far  as 
possible  in  his  own  words,  an  idea  of  the  con- 
ditions, the  ideals  and  the  broad  humanity  un- 
derlying the  labor  situation. 

It  seemed  to  me  that  I  should  be  more  likely 
to  find  such  a  man  in  Chicago  than  anywhere 
else.  In  the  democratic  Middle  West  of  the 
United  States  the  common  man  is  probably 
more  expressive  than  anywhere  else  in  the 
world.  Labor,  there,  is  more  self-conscious 
and  socially,  if  not  politically,  more  powerful 
than  elsewhere.  The  proletariat  of  America, 
and  more  especially  of  the  progressive  and  in- 
tensely vital  Middle  West,  is  no  real  prole- 
tariat, in  the  dumb  and  crushed  European 
sense,  but  in  its  hopefulness  and  early  activity, 
in  the  breadth  of  its  interests;  in  its  mental 
joyousness  and  vitality,  seems  to  have  the  qual- 
ity of  a  Renaissance. 

In  my  search  for  a  man  who  stood  at  the 

[II] 


Preface* 

center  of  the  labor  world,  I  therefore  went  to 
Chicago,  the  hot-bed  of  the  Middle  West,  the 
place  where  labor  is  most  riotous,  most  ex- 
pressive, where  the  workingman  abounds  in 
his  own  sense  and  has  formed  an  atmosphere 
of  democracy  extending  far  beyond  his  own 
class.  There  I  at  once  came  in  contact  with 
so  many  vigorous  personalities,  that  I  was,  for 
a  long  time,  swamped  by  the  richness  of  the 
human  material. 

I  went  to  their  saloons,  T  visited  them  in 
their  homes.  I  was  astonished  by  their  prac- 
tical knowledge  of  mankind,  I  was  fascinated 
by  their  temperament  and  robustness  and  joy 
in  life,  I  was  touched  by  their  altruism  and 
feeling  of  human  solidarity.  I  felt  a  kind 
of  class  sweetness  under  their  rough  manners, 
and  also  a  class  rebelliousness,  a  rebelliousness 
which  could  not  have  arisen  if  they  had  not 
been  comparatively  well-off,  for  the  necessary 
energy  would  otherwise  have  been  lacking. 
I  saw  how  a  new  morality  was  forming  on  the 
basis  of  a  new  public  opinion  different  from 

[12] 


Preface, 

the  past  public  opinion  upon  which  much  of 
present  law  is  based.  One  rather  disagree- 
able expression  of  this  new  morality  was  the 
suspiciousness  with  which  for  a  long  time  they 
regarded  me.  They  saw  that  I  was,  in  their 
meaning  of  the  word,  a  parasite:  I  did  not 
work  with  my  hands.  I  was  therefore  a  mem- 
ber of  the  capitalist  class,  they  felt,  and  would 
bear  watching.  One  night,  early  in  my  Chi- 
cago experience,  I  was  set  upon  in  a  saloon 
and  slugged  by  friends  of  Sam  Parks,  about 
whom  I  had  in  all  sincerity  and  friendliness 
expressed  an  unfavorable  opinion. 

This  little  episode  hurt  my  feelings  at  the 
time,  and,  incidentally,  changed  the  shape  of 
my  nose.  But,  after  a  few  months,  when  I 
had  come  more  sympathetically  to  understand 
the  feeling  of  the  men  and  the  difficulties  of 
the  leaders,  I  saw  that  I  was  at  least  ignorant, 
if  not  unkind,  when  I  expressed  an  absolute, 
unmodified  condemnation  of  a  man  like  Parks. 
And,  although  even  now,  I  do  not  approve  of 
the  manner  in  which  the  men  in  the  saloon 

[13] 


Preface. 

expressed  their  sense  of  my  unphilosophic  nar- 
rowness, I  can  realize  that  their  action  was 
based  upon  some  obscure  feelings  not  entirely 
unjust  and  brutal. 

After  a  time,  my  friends  became  less  sus- 
picious, and  pari  passu  more  interesting  to  me. 
But  as  the  richness  of  the  material  grew  more 
apparent,  the  difficulties  in  the  way  of  my  task 
became  greater.  The  men  with  temperament 
among  them  were  intensely  alive,  so  alive  that 
^*art"  seemed  to  them  a  mere  trivial  excres- 
cence due  to  the  superfluous  well-being  of  the 
capitalist  class :  and  since,  in  their  feeling,  lit- 
erature, history,  art,  law  and  religion,  as  they 
are  to-day,  had  for  the  most  part  originated 
on  the  basis  of  an  unjust  social  order,  so  these 
things  tended  to  keep  the  proletariat  en- 
slaved: they  tended  to  cradle  the  mind  and 
senses  and  make  man  ignobly  content  with  his 
bonds. 

So  that  my  scheme  for  a  book  did  not  inter- 
est them  in  the  slightest — not  the  real  men 
among  them.    They  were  too  active  to  take 

[14] 


Preface. 

the  contemplative  point  of  view :  they  thought, 
but  their  thought  had  the  unformed  and  frag- 
mentary character  of  action.  And  then,  too, 
as  I  have  said,  they  distrusted  the  moral  and 
social  tendencies  of  "culture."  They  were  too 
genuinely  interested  in  themselves  and  the 
"movement"  to  be  able  to  see  themselves  as  a 
whole.  They  lacked  variety,  and  though  they 
talked  extremely  well  about  the  things  that 
interested  them,  they  became  stiff,  inexpres- 
sive and  conventional  when  I  induced  them 
to  talk  about  their  lives  and  their  personal 
opinions.  The  vanity  of  a  pickpocket,  the 
sense  for  self-advertisement  of  a  soubrette,  eas- 
ily lends  itself  to  the  egotism  of  autobiogra- 
phy. But  the  active  impersonality  and  seri- 
ousness of  a  laborer  lacks  the  pleasure  in  sub- 
jective contemplation  and  in  the  recherche 
of  the  ego  which  is  of  prime  necessity  in  auto- 
biography. 

The  world  of  labor  is  so  big — it  has  so 
markedly  not  only  the  character  of  a  great 
human  thing,  but  also  connects  itself  so  defi- 

[15] 


Preface, 

nitely  with  history  and  politics, — it  has  so 
many  aspects,  so  many  threads,  that  no  one 
man  can  possibly  stand  at  the  center  of  it. 
That  is  another  discovery,  which,  indeed,  I 
was  rather  slow  in  making,  and  another  diffi- 
culty in  the  way  of  my  enterprise.  I  became 
deeply  interested  in  one  man  after  another, 
but  in  every  case  I  found  that  either  the  man 
was  not  sufficiently  typical  of  what  I  imagined 
the  labor  situation  to  be,  or  that  he  lacked  an 
interest  in  my  work,  or  was  not  sufficiently  ex- 
pressive for  my  purpose. 

At  last,  however,  after  being  in  Chicago  for 
several  months,  I  did  meet  a  man  whose  tem- 
perament and  character,  and  experience,  both 
as  a  type  and  as  a  person,  seemed  to  combine 
much  that  I  wanted.  I  remember  well  the 
occasion  of  our  first  meeting.  It  was  at  the 
bar  of  the  Briggs  House.  He  stood,  drinking 
a  glass  of  beer,  and  talking  with  energy  and 
rough  irony  to  a  couple  of  newspaper  men, 
about  the  teamsters'  strike.  I  was  immedi- 
ately struck  with  his  intellectual  vigor,  his 

[i6] 


Preface. 

free,  anarchistic  habit  of  mind,  and  the  rough, 
sweet  health  of  his  personality.  We  had  a 
long  discussion  about  Tolstoi's  ideas  of  "non- 
resistance,"  about  labor,  about  life.  I  found 
him  wonderfully  expressive:  he  excited  me 
most  pleasurably,  and  I  made  an  appointment 
with  him  for  the  next  day. 

He  was  too  busy  for  me  to  see  much  of  at 
that  time.  He  worked  in  the  shop  every  day, 
and  his  nights  were  usually  given  up  to  trades- 
union  activities,  or  to  "radical"  meetings,  of 
one  kind  or  another.  Soon  after,  I  left  town 
for  the  summer.  While  away,  I  wrote  my 
friend,  told  him  what  I  wanted,  described  as 
well  as  I  could  the  work  that  I  had  planned, 
and  asked  him  for  his  co-operation.  He 
wrote  back  a  good-natured  letter  of  consent; 
and  on  the  basis  of  that  I  returned  to  Chicago 
in  the  autumn  and  spent  there  three  of  the 
most  interesting  months  of  my  life. 

He  lived  in  Austin,  a  suburb  of  Chicago. 
I  went  to  a  boarding-house  near  by,  so  as  to  be 
near  him  and  his  family.     He  was  busier  than 

[17] 


Preface. 

ever:  he  was  a  man  of  growing  importance 
in  the  Federation,  he  still  actively  worked  in 
the  shop,  his  need  of  social  pleasure  was 
strong  and  constant,  and  his  "radical"  friends 
and  activities  were  many.  When  I  was  with 
him  in  the  bosom  of  his  family — where  I  was 
received  with  the  utmost  hospitality, — or  in 
company  with  his  trades-union  co-workers,  or 
his  "radical"  friends,  I  found  his  talk  always 
expressive,  significant  and  most  interesting. 

But  I  discovered  to  my  disappointment  that 
I  could  not  interest  him  in  my  work.  He  was 
not  at  all  interested  in  his  autobiography  or 
in  what  I  could  make  out  of  it;  and  it  was 
only  when  he  thought  himself  working  with 
me  that  he  was  comparatively  uninteresting. 
He  hated  to  commit  himself  to  anything,  or 
to  feel  that,  when  once  he  was  out  of  the  shop, 
he  need  do  anything  except  enjoy  his  body  or 
his  mind  and  temperament  in  the  way  he  saw 
fit.  And  no  prospect  of  any  material  compen- 
sation as  a  result  of  the  work  had  any  effect 
upon  him.     I  found  him  so  thoroughly  a  man 

[i8] 


Preface. 

of  temperament,  that  by  excess,  it  precluded 
the  artistic  results  of  temperament. 

But,  although  we  did  not  "hit  it  ofif"  very 
well  in  what  we  called  our  work,  we  got  along 
extremely  well  together  in  life.  I  became  al- 
most a  member  of  his  family,  and  came  to  oc- 
cupy an  acknowledged  place  in  the  circle  of 
his  radical  friends.  I  grew  to  be  so  much 
interested  in  many  of  his  companions,  male 
and  female,  and  so  thoroughly  absorbed  and 
fascinated,  that  the  need  of  making  use  of  it 
all  seemed  very  remote  to  me.  My  own  fam- 
ily, however,  beckoned  to  me  from  distant 
New  York,  and  I  finally  tore  myself  up  by  my 
acquired  roots,  and  departed. 

The  total  result  of  my  Chicago  experience 
was  to  make  me  feel  that  in  this  work  the 
autobiographical  form  must  be  given  up. 
The  man  and  the  subject  was  at  once  too  in- 
teresting, too  significant  and  too  inexpressive. 
I  was  compelled  to  choose  the  more  circum- 
stantial, comprehensive,  if  slower,  less  vivid 
and  less  exciting  form  of  biography;  to  tell 

[«9] 


Preface. 

about  the  man,  his  life,  his  friends,  often  quot- 
ing his  words,  but  sometimes  resorting  to  my 
own.  The  looser  and  freer  form  of  biography 
had  the  advantage  of  enabling  me  to  bring 
into  the  book  a  good  deal  in  Chicago  and  its 
people  which  is  influenced  and  determined  by 
the  character  of  America's  intellectual  pro- 
letariat; although  not  immediately  belonging 
to  the  world  of  labor. 


[20] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor 


[21] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 


CHAPTER  I. 

Early  Youth. 

Anton,  when  I  met  him  in  the  saloon  of  the 
Briggs  House,  was  thirty-three  years  old — 
old  enough  to  have  experienced  a  great  deal, 
and  young  enough  to  retain  the  excited  point 
of  view  about  life.  He  is  a  woodworker, 
making  the  best  wages  at  his  trade,  and  has 
been  in  steady  employment  for  some  years. 
That  fact,  however,  has  not  limited  his  energy 
in  other  ways.  Of  late  he  has  become  an  im- 
portant man  in  Chicago  labor  circles,  and  last 
autumn  was  the  Chicago  delegate  to  the  In- 
ternational Labor  Congress  at  Pittsburg.  He 
is  the  President  of  his  local  union,  and  in 
trades-union  matters  very  active  in  every  way. 
He  is  an  effective  speaker,  and  enjoys  an  in- 
tellectual bout  on  the  floor  with  any  man. 
He  now  meets  men  of  all  walks  of  life  and 
[23] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

finds  it  interesting  to  measure  his  strength 
with  theirs.  He  derives  keen  mental  satisfac- 
tion from  contact  with  local  philosophers  and 
"radicals"- — and  to  their  meetings  he  goes  as 
a  relief  from  the  more  strenuous  occupation 
in  trades-union  matters. 

The  contrasts  in  the  life  of  this  working- 
man  have  been  marked.     He  began  adult  life 
as  a  tramp,  picked  up  a  knowledge  of  his  trade 
on  the  road,  and  came  in  contact  there,  also, 
with  the  injustice  of  organized  society:  this 
made  him  think,  and  laid  the  foundation  of 
his  later  radicalism.     Love  for  a  girl  came 
in — he  had  his  great  adventure — and  this  took 
him,  eventually,  away  from  the  road.     Chil- 
dren came,  and  with  them  comparative  fixity 
of  purpose,  and  the  turning  of  the  man's  en- 
ergy into  the  deepening  of  his  social  and  in- 
tellectual life.     Many  leaders  in  the  labor 
world,  starting  with  sympathy  for  the  "rank 
and  file,"  lose  that  sympathy  when  they  be- 
come leaders.     But  Anton  has,  at  any  rate 
as  yet,  retained  the  essential  qualities  of  the 
workingman,  although  he  is  endowed  with  far 
more  energy  and  brains  and  character  than  the 
average.    This  is  partly  due  to  the  fact  that 
he  still  works  in  the  shop,  among  the  men, 
[24] 


Early  Youth. 

and  partly  to  his  steadfast  refusal  to  become 
a  "politician"  in  the  movement.  In  the  Fed- 
eration meetings  he  is  a  free-lance,  bold,  ag- 
gressive, terribly  frank  at  times,  v^ith  a  youth- 
ful pleasure  in  shocking  his  companions,  but 
of  sterling  honesty  and  a  deep  joy  in  the  truth, 
because  it  is  the  truth,  the  exciting  truth,  no 
matter  if  it  hurts,  no  matter  though  it  be  quite 
out  of  place.  To  express  what  he  deems  the 
truth,  in  season  and  out,  is  to  him  almost  an 
emotional  dissipation.       ^" 

When  I  met  Anton  in  the  Briggs  House,  his 
face  and  manner  indicated  his  character  and 
his  experience.  He  has  the  powerful  body  of 
the  young  mechanic — not  lithe  or  graceful, 
but  with  the  strength  of  a  gnarled  root.  He 
is  short  and  thick-set,  with  stubbed  and  horny 
hands;  his  head  is  a  bullet,  his  brow  broad, 
his  eyes  large,  deep,  and  kind;  his  voice  big. 
The  lines  in  his  face  show  a  man  who  has 
lived  roughly:  his  life  on  the  road  was  almost 
as  rough  as  they  come.  Yet  his  hard  life  has 
not  made  his  face  hard.  He  is  rough  in  man- 
ner and  in  look;  and  his  appearance  shows 
experience.  But  in  spite  of  the  many  sordid 
facts  of  his  life,  there  is  no  suggestion  of  hard- 
ness about  him.  He  looks  big  and  open,  as 
[25] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

he  is.  The  sweetness  and  the  roughness  of 
simple  humanity  are  in  his  face.  And  he 
meets  men  in  this  spirit — often  with  brusque 
roughness,  but  always  with  the  essential  re- 
spect for  others  that  sweetness  gives. 

This  man  was  born  abroad:  as  is  the  way 
with  the  typical  American  workingman.  His 
home  was  in  Germany,  in  Schleswig-Holstein. 
His  father  was  a  house-roofer,  a  jolly  fellow 
who  liked  to  drink  too  much  and  who  caused 
his  family  much  trouble.  He  was  a  fat,  round 
person,  a  great  story-teller,  and  great  as  a 
father,  for  he  had  twelve  children,  of  whom 
eight  died,  through  neglect,  for  the  mother 
was  forced  to  go  out  working,  and  the  children 
were  left  to  themselves.  She  washed  for  the 
farmers  in  the  neighborhood,  often  not  return- 
ing home  till  2  o'clock  in  the  morning,  and 
going  away  to  work  again  at  6. 

When  the  father  went  to  America,  to  find 
a  home  for  his  family,  the  oldest  sister  was 
glad  to  see  him  go.  He  was  in  the  way,  she 
thought.  The  wife  cried,  when  he  went,  and 
Anton  prayed,  for  Anton  was  the  only  earn- 
est Christian  among  the  children.  "When 
mother  was  out  working,"  he  said  "I  always 
waited  till  she  came  back,  no  matter  how  late 
[26] 


Early  Youth. 

it  was,  so  that  I  could  say  my  prayers,  before  I 
went  to  sleep.  At  that  time  I  accepted  every- 
thing that  the  preacher  said.  I  imagined  that 
his  every  remark  was  the  essence  of  the  Holy 
Ghost." 

He  was  a  loving  child,  and  by  nature  and 
education  had  the  patience  and  reverence  that 
is  part  of  the  laborer's  character.  "I  was  very 
happy,"  he  said,  "when  I  could  bring  my 
mother  some  pennies.  I  used  to  sing  for  them, 
on  the  farms."  It  was  the  custom  for  the  chil- 
dren to  stand  at  the  back-door  to  beg  for  the 
dinner  that  they  were  to  take  to  school.  In 
the  fall  of  the  year,  the  farmers  killed  hogs, 
and  the  children  begged  part  of  the  meat,  and 
took  it  home.  On  New  Year's  eve  the  chil- 
dren would  go  around  the  village,  singing,  for 
coins  and  baked  things.  Anton  was  a  favorite 
on  that  night,  for  he  was  a  good  singer,  and 
had,  as  he  said,  "an  unlimited  amount  of  gall." 

He  went  to  the  parish  school  where  he 
"learned  religion,"  as  he  put  it,  and  a  little 
mathematics ;  also  to  swim,  as  that  was  a  part 
of  the  program  of  the  government,  to  train  the 
boys  for  soldiers.  He  also  learned  to  take  a 
beating  with  equanimity. 

For  the  grown  people  in  that  village  had 
[27] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor, 

many  superstitions.  One  was  a  strong  belief 
in  the  need  of  beating  little  children.  An- 
ton's father,  mother,  sister  and  school-teacher 
all  beat  him  with  great  frequency.  "My 
father  was  good-natured,"  he  said,  "but  bad 
whiskey  drove  him  to  this  brutality.  In  spite 
of  my  religious  tendencies,  the  slightest  error 
or  mistake  on  my  part  would  mean  a  sound 
thrashing.  The  effect  of  the  rod  was  to  make 
me  want  revenge,  but  not  at  that  time  so  much 
as  later,  for  I  thought  I  was  born  to  work  and 
slave  and  be  beaten — that  was  the  fundamental 
doctrine  of  the  Bible,  as  it  was  conveyed 
to  me."  1 

Another  superstition  was  the  universal  be- 
lief in  witches.  The  parents  "grafted,"  said 
Anton,  "on  this  superstition,  using  it  as  a  club 
to  keep  us  indoors  at  night.  I  imagined  I 
saw  witches  everywhere,  and  used  to  turn  it 
to  account  by  frightening  other  children.  I 
remember  getting  under  the  house  and  mak- 
ing horrible  noises.  I  didn't  see  why  I  should 
not  make  use  of  the  witches,  if  my  parents  did. 
But  they  objected  to  my  graft,  and  my  sister 
beat  me  with  a  soup-bone." 

One  of  the  most  vivid  memories  from  his 
childhood  was  of  the  insufficient  food.  Many 
[28] 


Early  Youth. 

is  the  time  he  went  hungry  to  bed,  because 
there  was  nothing  to  eat  in  the  house.  At 
the  best,  the  bill  of  fare  was  dry  bread  and 
potatoes,  salt  lard  and  tallow  in  place  of  but- 
ter. Once  a  year,  "on  Christmas,  when  the 
birth  of  Christ  was  celebrated,"  he  interjected, 
satirically,  "we  had  butter  and  white  bread." 
Meat  was  to  be  had  only  when  the  farmers 
were  killing.  The  mother  used  to  go  out 
early  in  the  morning  for  craw-fish,  and  would 
also  gather  driftwood  for  the  fires. 

After  the  father  had  been  away  two  years, 
the  family  followed  him  to  Clinton,  Iowa, 
where  he  had  settled.  They  were  only  four 
then ;  the  other  children  had  died.  The  only 
doctors  in  the  village  were  the  druggists  and 
the  preachers,  but  probably  the  children  would 
have  died  anyway,  from  poor  food  and  neg- 
lect. "I  was  glad,"  said  Anton,  "to  go  to 
America,  for  I  thought  I  would  not  need  to 
beg  there,  and  that  I  could  get  enough  to  eat." 

"I  enjoyed  the  trip  across  the  ocean,  for  I 
got  extra  food  from  the  steward  for  doing 
dirty  work.  The  grub  was  awful  filthy,  but 
there  was  enough  of  it.  One  day  I  went  with- 
out my  extra  rations,  because  I  fell  down- 
stairs with  a  dozen  bottles,  and  the  cook 
[29] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

thought  he  ought  to  discipline  me.  A  boy 
finds  a  moral  teacher  wherever  he  goes.  This 
world  is  said  to  be  a  bad  one,  but  as  for  me  I 
find  virtue  everywhere,  more's  the  pity. 

"After  nineteen  days  we  reached  New  York, 
very  lousy  from  our  steerage  experience,  and 
landed  in  Castle  Garden.  The  first  thing  I 
noticed  was  a  negro.  I  had  never  seen  one 
before,  and  I  thought  he  was  the  devil.  But 
he  told  me  his  color  was  due  to  the  climate, 
and  that  I  would  soon  be  as  black  as  he  was. 
As  my  youngest  brother  had  been  very  ill  on 
the  voyage,  the  doctor  in  New  York  sent  him 
and  mother  to  a  hospital  for  ten  days,  and  the 
other  children  to  an  orphan  asylum.  In  this 
place  they  put  us  through  a  course  of  gym- 
nastics: we  had  all  the  exercises  except  stom- 
ach exercises.  The  food,  indeed,  was  little 
and  bad.  Here,  too,  I  got  my  regular  beat- 
ings. I  began  to  think  that  I  was  owned  by 
the  whole  world  and  that  everybody  was  good 
but  me." 

When  they  reached  Clinton,  Iowa,  they 
found  the  father  there  doing  much  better  than 
he  had  done  in  Germany.  He  was  driving 
a  beer  wagon  for  a  German  brewer,  and  was 
a  great  favorite  with  his  employer,  who 
[30] 


Early  Youth. 

weighed  four  hundred  pounds  and  enjoyed 
the  father's  jokes.  "Father  was  naturally  a 
great  jollier,"  said  Anton,  "and  that  kind  of  a 
man  gets  along  in  America."  The  brewer 
drank  a  keg  of  beer  every  day  and  soon  "died 
of  avoirdupois."  Anton's  father  then  became 
bartender  and  afterwards  saloon-keeper,  and 
prospered,  because  he  told  good  stories  and 
knew  when  to  treat  and  when  to  extort  pay- 
ment. 

In  this  American  town  Anton  went  to  school 
more  or  less  for  two  winters;  and  acquired 
there  the  reputation  of  a  bad  boy.  "The  spirit 
of  protest,"  he  said,  "which  is  now  developed 
to  a  considerable  extent,  began  to  stir  in  me. 
Whenever  the  teacher  asked  me  why  I  was 
tardy,  I  told  her  the  truth,  and  the  other  boys 
lied.  So  I  was  beaten  and  the  other  boys  were 
not;  and  this  seemed  to  me  unjust.  One  day 
the  school-teacher  beat  my  little  brother,  and 
I  attacked  the  teacher,  and  the  stove  fell  over 
on  us.  Father  took  my  side,  and  rescued  me 
from  this  affair.  A  few  months  before  Easter, 
when  I  was  preparing  for  confirmation,  the 
teacher  and  the  minister  asked  me,  with  a  view 
to  finding  out  the  effect  of  the  religious  teach- 
ing, what  I  would  do  with  my  wife,  if  she 
[313 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

were  negligent  in  the  household  affairs.  I  re- 
plied promptly  that  I  would  run  away.  On 
another  occasion  I  insisted  there  were  witches 
in  the  town.  The  teacher  said  there  were  not. 
But  as  I  had  seen  them  with  my  own  eyes,  and 
as  my  parents  had  told  me  these  things  existed, 
I  thought  the  teacher  was  a  liar,  and  told 
him  so." 

Finally  the  school  became  too  warm  for 
him,  and  he  left  and  went  to  work  in  a  brick 
yard  at  twenty-five  cents  a  day.  This  was  his 
first  experience  as  a  workingman.  He  was 
then  twelve  years  old,  and  worked  ten  hours 
a  day,  at  turning  and  hacking  brick,  hurd 
work,  but  he  became  the  best  turner  in  the 
yard.  He  was  a  favorite  with  the  boss,  for 
when  work  was  slack  he  peeled  potatoes  for 
the  employer's  wife.  "I  did  this  for  a  couple 
of  years,  but  my  industry  had  no  effect  on  my 
boss.  He  took  it  as  a  matter  of  course. 
Wasn't  I  getting  twenty-five  cents  a  day?" 

Although  Anton's  father  was  working  stead- 
ily at  this  time,  his  mother  still  went  out  to 
wash,  and  his  sister  worked  as  hired  girl.  He 
had  no  holidays  but  Sunday,  and  so  his  life, 
at  twelve  years  of  age,  was  almost  all  work. 
"I  don't  think,"  he  said,  "that  any  one  of  my 
[32] 


Early  Youth. 

family  enjoyed  life ;  I  am  sure  I  did  not,  as  a 
child.  Perhaps  my  father  did,  for  he  drank 
heavily,  and  always  had  a  good  story  to  tell." 
The  father  was  the  only  one  of  them  who  lived 
the  life  of  the  temperament.  At  least,  he  be- 
longed to  the  poor  man's  club,  and  often 
J         talked  eloquently  to  the  men  in  the  saloon. 

When  he  was  fourteen,  Anton  went  to  work 
in  a  sash  and  door  factory,  where  every  man 
and  boy  had  his  place  like  a  machine.  He 
worked  there  on  and  ofif  for  eight  years,  mak- 
ing window  frames  and  nothing  else.  It  was 
monotonous  work,  and  he  learned  little  from 
it.R  "If  I  had  never  run  away  from  home," 
he  said,  "I  would  never  have  become  a  me- 
chanic. The  work  there  was  too  monotonous, 
and  the  men  took  no  interest  in  the  boys  and 
did  not  teach  them  anything.  I  got  fifty  cents 
a  day  for  ten  hours'  work,  and  after  six  years 
was  getting  only  a  dollar  a  day.  But  at  that 
time  I  did  not  think  much  about  the  wages. 
I  wouldn't  have  minded  if  it  had  not  been  for 
the  monotony  of  it.  I  became  awfully  bored, 
which  always  happens  to  me  when  anything 
lasts  too  long." 

When  Anton  was  sixteen,  there  was  a  strike, 
under  the  auspices  of  the  Knights  of  Labor. 
[33] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

It  did  not  involve  his  shop,  but  he  at  once  felt 
in  sympathy  with  the  purposes  of  the  strikers. 
It  was  a  mob  strike ;  the  strikers  were  not  or- 
ganized and  they  lost.  This  was  the  first 
strike  that  came  to  Anton's  attention.  "But  I 
felt  at  once,"  he  said,  "that  the  other  fellows 
were  in  reality  our  enemies,  and  were  trying 
to  get  all  they  could  out  of  us  and  give  us  as 
little  in  return  as  we  would  accept.       ^ 

"Under  the  circumstances,  I  felt  justified  in 
killing  as  much  time  as  I  could  without  being 
discharged.  The  monotony  of  the  employ- 
ment and  the  greed  of  the  employer  took  all 
interest  away  from  the  work.  So  I  organized 
a  number  of  boys  into  a  kind  of  entertainment 
society.  We  built  a  watch-house  in  the  shop, 
and  while  one  boy  acted  as  the  look-out,  the 
others  played  cards,  during  the  work  hours. 
We  kept  this  up  for  months,  but  I  was  finally 
caught  and  laid  ofif  a  day.  My  father  threat- 
ened to  thrash  me  if  I  didn't  get  my  job  back. 
At  that  time  my  father  was  running  the  saloon 
and  I  sometimes  used  to  tend  bar  for  him  in 
the  evening.  I  was  to  do  so  on  that  night,  as 
the  old  gent  was  uptown.  Instead,  I  left 
home  without  saying  good-bye  to  anybody,  got 
in  a  box-car  half  loaded  with  shelled  corn,  and 
in  a  few  hours  I  was  in  Chicago.  I  was  then 
eighteen  years  old." 

[34] 


CHAPTER  II. 
On  the  Road.  ^ 

Now  began  a  period  of  wandering,  often 
interrupted  by  brief  returns  to  his  family  in 
Clinton.  He  became  one  of  the  large  class 
of  nomadic  workingmen,  so  to  speak,  who  are 
as  much  hobo  as  laborer;  indeed,  many  of 
them  more  so,  as  they  work  only  in  order  to 
earn  enough  money  for  a  "front,"  a  suit  of 
clothes,  and  then  restlessly  pass  on. 

On  this  first  trip  he  was  in  Chicago  only  a 
short  time.  He  boldly  pretended  to  be  a  me- 
chanic, but  was  discharged  for  incompetency 
a  few  days  after  finding  his  first  job.  He  then 
washed  dishes  in  a  restaurant  for  a  night  or 
two,  but  dropped  this  for  a  magnificent  posi- 
tion on  a  railroad  at  $1.40  a  day — high  wages 
for  him,  who  lived  at  the  time  on  25  cents  a 
day.  The  old  feeling  of  monotony  inter- 
rupted this  lucrative  work,  and,  after  three 
days,  he  quit — and  did  not  get  his  money. 

Beating  his  way  to  Burlington,  he  worked 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

eight  days  as  a  woodworker,  but  was  dis- 
charged: he  was  not  yet  a  mechanic.  But 
each  time  this  happened,  he  was  a  little  wiser : 
knew  a  little  more  of  his  trade.  Conditions 
were  slightly  different  in  each  shop,  there  was 
greater  variety  than  in  the  monotonous  work 
at  Clinton,  and,  as  time  went  on,  he  learned. 

At  Burlington  he  lost  his  watch,  as  well  as 
his  job,  and  was  "broke."  Then  he  begged, 
for  the  first  time,  and  took  another  step  to- 
wards membership  in  Hoboland.  Previously 
to  begging  he  had  lived  for  two  days  on  water- 
melons that  had  burst  and  been  thrown  away. 
At  this  time,  he  was  very  much  discouraged. 
He  was  willing  to  work,  and  saw  the  utter 
lack  of  sympathy  in  the  people  he  met.  He 
felt  particularly  the  jealousy  of  the  mechanics, 
who  refused  to  teach  him  anything.  He  per- 
ceived that  he  was  thrown  entirely  on  his  own 
resources,  and  as  he  is  naturally  generous  and 
kind  himself,  he  felt  this  coldness  deeply. 

He  managed  to  beat  his  way  in  a  box-car 
to  Cedar  Rapids,  and  thence  home,  to  Clin- 
ton. His  trip  had  not  been  a  spectacular  suc- 
cess, but,  when  he  reached  home,  he  was,  he 
said,  "as  proud  as  a  peacock."  He  felt  he  was 
a  hero  and  had  been  almost  around  the  world. 


On  the  Road. 

But  the  good  people  of  Clinton  "gave  him  the 
laugh"  for  coming  back  so  soon.  "I  stood  in 
the  saloon,"  he  said,  "and  tried  to  brag  to  the 
other  boys,  but  they  could  not  see  it  that  way." 

He  had  been  away  two  months,  and  was 
glad  to  get  back ;  but  the  ridicule  of  the  boys 
and  the  need  of  work  sent  him  away  again  in 
four  or  five  days.  Without  saying  anything 
to  his  family,  he  boarded  another  box-car  and 
was  off  for  Council  Bluffs. 

In  the  box-car  he  met  a  tramp  with  a  philo- 
sophic turn  of  mind.  He  was  a  mechanic  and 
had  had  some  good  jobs.  After  Anton  heard 
this  man  talk,  he  vaguely  felt  that  his  life  in 
Clinton  had  been  a  narrow  one,  and  that  he 
had  had  no  real  opportunities  there.  Dimly 
it  seemed  to  him,  too,  that  his  misfortunes, 
somehow,  were  more  profound  and  radical 
even  than  that.  "I  didn't  know  anything 
about  Socialism,"  he  said.  "But  I  liked  the 
talk  of  that  tramp.  He  made  me  feel  that  I 
had  been  deprived  of  opportunities,  that  I  had 
been  denied  the  right  to  live.  The  spirit  of 
protest  grew  stronger  within  me,  though  I  was 
not  clear  yet  about  anything.  Even  as  early 
as  this  I  began  to  think  that  Christianity  was 
a  humbug  and  that  I  had  been  hoodwinked. 
[37] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

This  tramp  talked  to  me  about  unions,  and  I 
felt  the  leaders  must  be  heroes,  all  spotless." 

At  that  time  Anton  had  never  been  to  a 
union  meeting,  had  never  read  a  book,  not 
even  a  newspaper,  and  had  never  had  a  real 
companion.  The  first  "intellectual"  man  he 
met  was  this  box-car  friend  of  his — this  hobo- 
mechanic  who  had  a  sprinkling  of  Socialistic 
ideas.  The  civilizing  influence  that  "radical" 
ideas  have  upon  the  entirely  uneducated  la- 
borer is  marked :  a  fact  that  will  be  abundant- 
ly illustrated  in  the  course  of  this  narrative. 

"This  box-car,"  he  said,  "seemed  to  me 
Paradise.  My  friend  the  Socialist  talked  like 
an  angel,  and  we  sang  the  song  'Playmates 
Are  We.'  He  was  a  Carl  Marx  man,  and  was 
friendly  to  unionism,  for  at  that  time  there 
was  not  so  much  antagonism  between  Social- 
ism and  trades-unionism  as  there  is  at  present." 
Anton  traveled  with  the  hobo  for  several 
weeks:  they  beat,  begged  and  worked  their 
way.  When  waiting  for  a  train,  they  built  a 
fire,  slept  or  talked,  or  fried  steaks  and  pre- 
pared coffee.  The  Socialist  talked  all  the 
time,  and,  although  Anton  has  forgotten  every- 
thing definite  that  was  said,  yet  he  still  regards 
this  man  as  his  first  friend. 
[38] 


On  the  Road. 

"I  remember,"  he  said,  "that  he  was  neat  in 
his  dress,  and  that  he  carried  soap  and  towels 
with  him  in  the  box-car — the  only  clean 
tramp  of  my  acquaintance.  He  also  used  to 
beg  often  for  a  wash  instead  of  a  cup  of 
coffee."  ^ 

Anton  tried  to  find  a  job  at  Council  Bluffs. 
He  dropped  into  the  Universal  Exchange,  a 
saloon,  and  after  being  cheated  by  the  saloon- 
keeper, got  a  tip  which  led  to  a  $3.5o-a-day  po- 
sition. He  hired  out  as  a  first-class  mechanic, 
"on  my  gall,"  as  he  put  it.  When  the  foreman 
saw  what  he  was  like,  he  paid  him  only  $2  a 
day,  but  that  seemed  very  big  to  Anton.  He 
held  this  job  only  a  short  time,  as  usual.  One 
day  he  was  making  hand-rails  for  fancy  stairs, 
and,  being  "not  even  a  second-class  mechanic," 
got  excited  when  the  boss  was  looking  on,  and 
spoiled  two  feet  of  a  rail.  "The  boss  grabbed 
me  by  the  neck  and  took  me  to  the  office.  He 
was  so  mad,"  said  Anton,  "I  thought  he  would 
kill  me ;  but  he  had  the  kindness  to  pay  me  $5 
for  three  days'  work.  So  he  did  not  cheat 
me  much." 

The  proprietor  of  a  restaurant  where  Anton 
ate  had  taken  a  fancy  to  him,  and  when  he 
lost  his  job  in  the  factory,  he  got  another  as  a 
[39] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

waiter.  Anton  was  a  jolly  singer  and  dancer, 
and  pleased  the  wife  and  daughter  of  the  pro- 
prietor, who  offered  him  $8  a  week  and  board 
to  stay  with  him.  "It  was  easy  work,"  said 
Anton.  "But  it  was  monotonous,  and  the  two 
women,  who  were  ugly,  made  love  to  me. 
After  a  while,  when  they  thought  they  had 
claims  on  me,  I  found  that  monotonous,  too. 
So  I  juhiped  on  a  box-car  and  went  to 
Omaha." 

He  took  a  trip  South  at  this  time,  passing 
rapidly  from  town  to  town,  from  one  job  to 
another,  from  periods  of  begging  and  "bum- 
ming" to  brief  periods  of  work. .  If  his  nat- 
ural restlessness  was  thus  being  intensified, 
there  was  the  compensation  that  he  was  rapid- 
ly learning  his  trade.  He  was  a  quick,  intel- 
ligent boy,  and  he  thinks  he  learned  more 
from  these  widely  varying  jobs  than  he  could 
have  done  through  any  careful  system  of  ap- 
prenticeship. During  his  wandering  period 
of  seven  years  the  longest  stay  he  ever  made 
was  four  months,  at  Fort  Worth. 

Sometimes  he  was  discharged  because  of  in- 
competence, more  often  because  of  his  "inde- 
pendence." Frequently  he  left  because  the 
work  became  monotonous,  and  he  desired  to 
[40] 


On  the  Road. 

pass  on.  When  he  had  a  few  dollars  in  his 
pocket  and  a  fairly  good  suit  of  clothes,  it  was 
hard  to  keep  him  at  his  job. 

"You  are  better  treated  at  the  beginning," 
he  said.  "While  a  stranger  you  get  more 
recognition.  They  treat  you  with  courtesy,  at 
first.  But  familiarity  breeds  contempt.  You 
wear  out  your  welcome.  When  that  stage 
came,  I  generally  moved.  When  I  heard  the 
train  whistle,  my  heart  throbbed,  and  I  wanted 
to  go.  In  the  spring  of  the  year  I  couldn't 
sleep  at  night  for  thinking  of  the  road,  and 
when  the  train  pulled  out,  I  generally  got  the 
fever  and  went  with  it." 

He  came  to  know  the  "road"  well,  learned 
to  beg  with  skill,  and  met  many  hoboes  and 
"yeggs."  What  he  learned  from  them  helped 
him  to  the  art  of  handling  men  which  he  is 
now  turning  to  account  in  his  trades-union  ac- 
tivity. "What  one  learns  from  the  yellow  and 
the  black  will  help  you  a  lot  with  the  white," 
he  quoted. 

Workingmen  who  are  engaged  in  any  un- 
stable work,  such  as  printers,  bricklayers,  and 
those  working  at  railroad  construction,  often 
become  hoboes.  They  are  not  the  real 
tramps,  whose  technical  name  is  "yegg."  The 
[41] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

latter  have  concluded  that  it  does  not  pay  to 
work.  To  do  so  is  dishonorable.  They 
therefore  despise  the  hoboes,  and  will  have 
nothing  to  do  with  them  socially.  They  are 
the  aristocrats  of  the  floating  population — 
more  truly  aristocrats  than  the  aristocrats  at 
the  top,  for  they  can  lose  nothing:  nothing 
worries  them,  and  they  are  more  exclusive 
than  the  Four  Hundred. 

Anton  was  often  snubbed  by  these  "swells" 
of  the  road.  From  motives  of  curiosity  he  at- 
tempted to  become  intimate  with  them,  but 
they  would  have  little  to  do  with  him.  Once, 
when  nearly  starving,  he  met  some  yeggs  sit- 
ting about  a  fire  and  eating.  They  refused 
to  share  their  food  with  him.  "Why  don't 
you  go  to  work?"  they  asked,  contemptuously. 
Then  they  threw  the  victuals  in  the  fire,  de- 
liberately. 

"Those  yeggs  interested  me,"  said  Anton. 
"But  I  never  had  a  desire  to  be  one  of  them. 
I  couldn't  see  their  philosophy.  They  were 
too  cruel,  too  hard-hearted.  They  care  for 
nobody  but  yeggs.  Solidarity  among  them  is 
absolute.  They  admire  good  thieves  and 
prostitutes,  but  even  these  are  not  admitted  to 
the  inner  circle.  Their  feeling  of  caste  is  aw- 
[42] 


On  the  Road. 

ful.  It  is  much  worse  than  that  of  the  capi- 
talist class.  Like  the  capitalist  class,  they  are 
careful  of  their  manners,  too.  They  will  steal 
if  they  get  a  chance,  but  they  won't  beg  at  the 
back  door.  They  won't  take  the  hand-out, 
nor  apply  for  work;  nor  will  they  wash  dishes 
or  saw  wood  for  a  breakfast  or  an  old  coat. 
There  is  only  one  way  that  a  yegg  can  honor- 
ably beg.  He  may  size  a  man  up  and  tackle 
him  in  the  street  for  money.  He  uses  the 
money  for  a  place  to  "flop,"  in  a  lodging- 
house.  If  any  is  left  over,  he  will  buy  alco- 
holic stimulants,  but  not  food.  That  is  dis- 
graceful, to  spend  money  for  food,  in  a  city. 
If  he  really  needs  a  meal,  he  will  try  for  a 
"chase-in" ;  he  will  beg  a  meal  ticket,  which  is 
much  more  readily  given  away  than  a  piece  of 
money. 

"The  yegg  will  have  nothing  to  do  with 
women.  He  prefers  boys,  and  in  this  way, 
too,  he  is  like  some  aristocrats.  Sitting 
around  their  fires,  or  smoking  their  snipes  (to- 
bacco picked  up  from  the  streets  and  re- 
rolled)  in  a  lodging-house  room,  they  talk  of 
the  kids  they  have  met  along  the  road:  praise 
this  one's  begging  powers,  that  one's  crooked- 
ness, another's  strength  as  a  hold-up  man — or 
[43] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

they  tell  of  having  met  Phil  Yegg  in  such  a 
place,  Omaha  Shin  in  another;  and  discuss 
where  the  bulls  (police)  are  most  hostile. 
They  do  not  rush  the  can  in  the  saloon,  as  the 
hoboes  do,  but  they  sit  together  in  the  back 
room  of  the  lodging-house  over  a  glass  of  beer, 
and  smoke  their  snipes.  As  long  as  there  is 
money  in  the  crowd,  there  is  no  question  of 
who  pays.  As  their  taste  for  social  pleasures 
is  identical  in  each  one,  there  is  no  need  of  one 
man  having  more  money  or  spending  more 
than  another.  In  this  respect,  they  are  Social- 
ists or  Communists. 

"The  yeggs  are  well  taken  care  of  by  the 
politicians.  They  go  to  places  where  they  are 
absolutely  safe,  such  as  some  of  the  resorts  pre- 
sided over  by  Hinky  Dink  and  Bathhouse 
John,  in  Chicago;  Bucket  of  Love,  in  St. 
Louis;  The  Three  Brothers,  in  New  Orleans, 
or  Sailors'  Home,  in  New  York.  Saloon- 
keepers and  politicians  have  no  regard  for 
hoboes,  but  they  know  that  yeggs  are  power- 
ful because  of  their  solidarity.  A  yegg  never 
forgets  an  affront,  and  his  boycott  is  everlast- 
ing and  complete:  it  spreads  like  wildfire 
throughout  the  world  of  the  road." 

One  day  I  went  with  Anton  to  hear  him 
[44] 


On  the  Road. 

make  a  speech  on  tramps  before  the  Social 
Science  League,  a  Chicago  organization  of 
"radicals."  After  describing  the  habits  of  the 
yeggs,  he  made  the  following  interesting  ap- 
plication : 

"Whether  we  like  or  dislike  the  tramp,  the 
fact  is  he  is  here  and  is  just  as  I  have  described 
him.  His  aim  in  life  is  to  escape  labor,  to  be 
a  parasite.  He  makes  a  profession  of  that. 
It  is  as  dishonorable  for  him  to  go  against  the 
rules  of  his  profession  as  it  is  for  a  preacher 
to  work  in  a  factory,  a  lawyer  on  a  farm,  or 
a  doctor  behind  a  saloon  bar.  The  yegg 
is  very  similar  to  these  other  professional  men. 
While  the  one  is  supposed  to  serve  justice,  the 
second  to  uplift  morals,  and  the  third  to  pre- 
serve the  health,  the  percentage  of  those  who 
confine  themselves  to  these  principles  is  so 
small  that  it  is  almost  invisible.  The  spirit 
of  commercialism  has  been  a  most  potent  fac- 
tor in  prostituting  these  professions.  The 
spirit  of  commerce  appears  to  me  very  largely 
directed  to  reaping  the  benefits  produced  by 
the  labor  of  others.  He  who  is  the  most  cun- 
ning among  the  lawyers  is  considered  to  be  the 
greatest.  He  among  the  preachers  who  can 
spellbind  the  best,  attains  to  the  most  salary; 
[45] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

the  doctor  who  can  give  the  best  reasons  for 
proving  that  artifice  is  better  than  nature,  is 
the  most  successful.  The  yegg  has  these  same 
characteristics.  He  is  a  cunning  and  shrewd 
thief;  and  he  plays  on  the  emotions  of  others, 
when  he  tells  the  wayfarer  a  hard-luck  story; 
the  fundamental  motive  is  always  to  escape 
labor.  The  yegg  very  seldom  criticizes  the 
methods  of  his  fellow  yegg.  And  this  same 
respect  for  the  graft  of  the  profession  we  see 
in  the  ranks  of  lawyers,  doctors  and  preach- 
ers." 

This  speech  was  made  long  after  Anton  had 
ceased  to  be  a  tramp.  But  he  began,  at  this 
early  stage  in  his  career,  to  form  some  of  the 
ideas  which  he  was  so  fond  of  expressing  at 
a  later  time.  He  was  not  long  on  the  road 
before  his  religious  ideas  began  to  grow  a  lit- 
tle vague;  not  that  he  had  become  definitely 
sceptical  as  yet,  but  that  this  side  of  him  re- 
ceived no  longer  any  nourishment.  One  sel- 
dom meets  a  religious  man  on  the  road,  or  one 
who  has  respect  for  the  law.  They  feel  the 
necessity  of  opposing  the  law,  because  the  law 
opposes  them. 

While  in  the  South,  on  this  trip,  our  hobo 
did  meet  one  religious  man,  but  his  religion 
[46] 


On  the  Road. 

took  an  industrial  turn.  He  was  called 
Preacher  Bill,  and  he  was  a  confirmed  hobo. 
He  would  sit  for  hours  and  argue  about  poli- 
tics and  industrialism.  He  was  a  great  agi- 
tator, and  was  called  "Preacher"  because  of 
the  enthusiasm  and  emotion  he  felt  for  the 
cause  of  the  workman  and  of  the  outcast. 

These  budding  ideas,  or  rather  feelings,  for 
tliey  lacked  the  definiteness  of  ideas,  made  it 
easier  for  him  to  beg  and  to  lead  a  rather  hard 
life  than  it  would  have  been  otherwise.  He 
became  a  good  "bummer,"  clever  at  getting  a 
dinner  or  a  suit  of  clothes.  I  found  out,  from 
my  own  intimacy  with  him  and  his  associates, 
that  he  certainly  "has  a  way  with  women" ;  it 
is  not  a  very  gentle  way,  but  it  is  effective,  and 
this  served  him  on  the  road.  One  day  he  hid 
his  overcoat,  his  hat  and  his  coat,  and  then 
went  to  a  house  and  begged  for  some  clothes, 
which  he  intended  to  sell.  The  good  woman, 
after  a  few  minutes'  talk,  gave  him  a  break- 
fast, a  suit  of  clothes,  underwear,  collar,  ties, 
shirt,  shoes,  and  some  money  for  a  hat. 

"Women  like  to  be  sympathetic,"  said  An- 
ton.    "That  is  the  way  they  get  their  graft." 

After  this  good  luck,  Anton  got  a  shave, 
bought  a  hat,  dressed  himself  well,  and  went 
•      [47] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

to  see  his  chum,  who  did  not  recognize  him. 
With  this  new  suit  of  clothes  "as  a  stall"  he 
went  to  New  Orleans,  where,  some  circus  men 
having  got  into  trouble,  he  on  his  arrival, 
was  rounded  up  as  a  stranger,  and,  in  spite  of 
his  good  clothes,  put  in  jail,  and  given  only 
half  a  bologna  sausage  to  eat.  But  it  was  as 
good  sleeping  there  as  in  a  box-car.  The  jail, 
indeed,  is  one  of  the  hotels  of  the  hobo.  The 
next  morning  he  was  discharged  by  the  magis- 
trate, and  with  him  a  yegg,  who  had  been 
"rounded  up"  at  the  same  time,  and  whom  he 
had  met  in  jail.  This  yegg  did  Anton  the 
honor  of  liking  him,  and  conducted  him  to 
Houston,  Texas,  to  a  headquarters  of  hoboes 
and  yeggs.  Here  numberless  hoboes  were 
controlled  by  a  few  yeggs,  who  spent  the  ho- 
boes' money  and  ate  their  food,  but  gave  them 
nothing  in  return. 

Then  he  and  his  friend  the  yegg  went  to  San 
Antonio,  where  they  met  a  bricklayer,  a  care- 
less hobo,  who  had  a  job  at  the  time,  at  his 
trade,  and  was  making  good  money.  He  had 
just  drawn  his  wages — $35;  it  was  Saturday 
night,  and  as  he  liked  the  two  strangers,  he 
took  a  box-car  with  them,  and  they  all  went  to 
Mexico.  He  and  Anton  treated  the  yegg  as  a 
[48]      . 


On  the  Road, 

king.  The  bricklayer  gave  him  all  his  mes- 
cal, a  kind  of  whiskey,  which  the  yegg  liked, 
but  which  Anton  found  better  adapted  for 
"killing  lice  than  for  drinking."  It  was  on 
this  Mexican  box-car  that  Anton  discovered 
the  true  reason  for  the  yegg's  friendship  for 
him.  It  was  a  reason  which  made  Anton  use 
a  knife,  in  order  to  defend  himself,  and  which 
determined  him  and  the  bricklayer  to  separate 
from  their  distinguished  companion.    ^  *- 

They  made  their  way  to  Laredo,  and  there, 
as  in  other  Mexican  towns,  they  found  that 
a  little  bad  whiskey  would  bring  them  what- 
ever they  wanted.  For  a  drink,  they  could 
get,  in  exchange,  food  and  a  bed  so  large  that 
it  contained  the  Mexican's  wife  and  daugh- 
ters, as  well  as  themselves.  It  was  not  neces- 
sary to  beg  in  Mexico.  There  the  people  are 
so  poor  that  they  give  whatever  they  have. 

A  man  who  comes  from  the  States  is  well 
treated  in  Mexico.  It  is  known  that  he  is  a 
better  workman  than  the  natives.  So  when 
Anton  arrived  in  Monterey,  without  a  "front," 
thinking  he  would  go  to  work,  under  favor- 
able circumstances,  he  and  the  bricklayer  sta- 
tioned themselves  before  a  restaurant.  The 
first  man  tackled  was  pleased  with  the  young 
[49] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor, 

woodworker,  gave  him  a  meal,  and  a  job  at 
$5  a  day.  The  bricklayer  obtained  employ- 
ment at  $12  a  day.  This  seemed  like  clover 
to  them  both,  and  the  bricklayer  staid  on.  So 
would  Anton  have  done  also,  had  it  not  been 
for  an  accident.  One  day  he  was  careless  with 
a  machine  and  nearly  killed  a  Mexican.  He 
realized  the  danger,  jumped  a  box-car  and 
made  for  the  States.  He  dropped  off  at  the 
first  Texas  town — Beaver — ran  for  the  first 
house  he  saw  and  was  hospitably  received  by 
a  young  widow,  who  in  return  for  some  gar- 
dening, gave  him  money,  clothes,  and  the  best 
of  food.  He  staid  with  her  four  days,  and  his 
motive  for  going  was  an  indication  of  his  pop- 
ularity with  the  sex.  "I  didn't  want  to  stay 
there  for  good,"  he  said. 

"I  never  had  much  trouble  with  the 
women,"  he  remarked,  not  complacently,  for 
he  is  not  given  to  that,  but  in  his  matter-of-fact 
way.  "I  remember  one  time  I  was  working  in 
Hammond  for  three  weeks,  because  I  wanted 
a  front  to  go  to  New  Orleans.  After  I  got 
together  a  few  dollars,  I  started,  with  a  con- 
tractor, for  the  big  city.  We  struck  the  town 
on  the  night  of  a  masquerade  ball;  and  we 
went  there  on  a  lark.  I  was  a  good  dancer, 
[50] 


On  the  Road. 

and  met  a  young  girl  who  introduced  me  to  her 
friends.  The  contractor  presented  me  as  the 
superintendent  of  the  plant  at  Hammond. 
We  met  the  girl's  five  sisters,  brother-in-law 
and  mother.  I  suggested  a  supper,  but  a  com- 
mon place  was  not  good  enough  for  me,  so  I 
told  them  to  take  us  to  the  swellest  restaurant 
in  town.  The  contractor  feared  he  would 
have  to  pay  the  bill  and  sneaked  away.  We 
went  to  a  fine  French  restaurant,  and  I  had  the 
meal  of  my  life,  with  all  kinds  of  expensive 
wines.  I  didn't  pay  a  cent.  They  insisted 
that  I  was  the  guest.  I  made  a  mash  on  the 
little  girl,  and  escorted  her  home ;  went  to  dine 
with  them  the  next  day,  and  the  old  lady  of- 
fered me  a  job  in  her  clothing  store  at  $50  a 
month.  I  nursed  it  along  for  a  while,  for  I 
was  stuck  on  the  little  girl.  But  I  couldn't 
keep  up  the  game,  as  I  had  no  trunk,  no  re- 
sources, and  had  to  lie  every  minute.  So  I 
skipped." 

On  virtuously  leaving  the  young  widow  at 
Beaver,  he  went  to  Corpus  Christi,  where  he 
arrived  the  day  before  Thanksgiving.  In  ac- 
cordance with  his  general  custom,  he  stood  be- 
fore a  restaurant,  for  a  "chase-in,"  and  there 
met  a  man  who  was  justice  of  the  peace  and 
[51] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

the  leader  of  a  band  of  minstrels.  "When  I 
told  him  I  was  a  theatrical  man,"  said  Anton, 
"he  was  interested,  and  gave  me  a  dollar.  He 
took  me  to  the  stage  manager,  whom  I  told  I 
had  been  stranded  at  Meridian.  I  passed  my- 
self ofif  as  a  character  singer  and  a  black-face 
comedian.  'Come  up  and  rehearse,'  he  said, 
and  gave  me  shirts,  collars  and  ties.  At  the 
five  o'clock  rehearsal  I  was  there,  but  as  I 
knew  nothing  whatever  about  music,  I  told 
them  I  was  very  sensitive  to  my  accompani- 
ment, and  that  I  must  sing  without  music.  I 
passed  the  examination,  and  was  engaged  for 
that  night's  performance.  When  the  time 
came  for  me  to  do  my  act,  I  went  on  and  sang 
without  music.  I  had  been  introduced  as  a 
stranded  actor,  and  I  took  the  house.  I  sang 
*On  the  Bridge  at  Midnight,'  and  I  had  $14 
thrown  at  me  from  the  audience.  After  the 
show,  the  minstrels  crowded  around  me  and 
wanted  me  to  stay  two  weeks,  and  would  pay 
my  restaurant  bills,  washing,  etc.  The  story 
went  around  the  town  like  wild-fire.  They 
more  or  less  got  on  to  me,  and  called  me  'the 
hobo-king.'  That  night  we  went  around  the 
town  serenading,  followed  by  a  big  crowd.  I 
sang  under  a  banker's  window.  He  invited  us 
[52] 


On  the  Road. 

in,  gave  us  drinks,  cigars,  and  handed  me  a 
ten-dollar  bill.  I  sang  at  the  theater  every 
night.  A  lady  in  town  took  up  a  collection  for 
me,  and  this  brought  me  in  $15.  A  printer 
made  500  copies  of  my  songs,  and  I  sold  them 
for  about  $20.  A  little  Spanish  girl  made 
love  to  me  and  gave  me  a  shell  fan.  I  was  a 
hero,  the  town  was  off  the  main  line,  and  that 
is  one  reason  why  they  liked  my  line  of  the- 
atricals. That's  the  first  time  I  ever  was  an 
actor.  I  wish  I  had  stopped  then.  But  I 
tried  it  once  more,  a  few  weeks  after  that,  in 
San  Antonio.  I  was  with  a  bum  crowd  of 
show  people.  One  of  them  ran  away  with 
the  money  and  the  audience  threw  potatoes  at 
the  rest  of  us.  We  had  to  run  away  without 
our  trunks,  to  avoid  being  lynched." 


[53] 


CHAPTER  IIL 
Injustice  and  Love, 

It  was  not  long  after  this  theatrical  experi- 
ence that  Anton  was  arrested  for  the  second 
time.  It  was  this  second  arrest  that  filled  him 
with  the  bitter  feeling  of  social  injustice. 
"Life  on  the  road,"  he  said,  "with  all  its 
chance  meetings  with  many  men  and  ways  of 
living  makes  one  tolerant  of  everything  except 
tyranny."  And  in  the  case  of  this  second  ar- 
rest, he  felt  he  had  come  in  contact  with  tyran- 
ny in  its  ordinary  and  commonplace,  and, 
therefore,  particularly  damnable,  form. 

It  was  at  Fort  Worth,  Texas.  He  had 
worked  in  the  town  before,  and  was  well  ac- 
quainted there,  but  as  he  was  now  on  the 
tramp,  and  accompanied  by  two  other  hoboes, 
he  did  not  want  to  be  seen  by  his  acquaint- 
ances. He  and  his  two  companions  were  eat- 
ing lunch  in  a  lodging-house  near  the  stock 
yards,  when  a  drunken  man  invited  himself  to 
partake  of  the  food.  He  fell  into  a  stupid 
[54] 


Injustice  and  Love. 

sleep,  and  while  in  that  condition  was  robbed 
of  seven  or  eight  dollars  by  the  two  hoboes. 
A  boy,  who  had  been  sent  for  some  whiskey, 
returned  at  the  moment  of  the  robbery,  and 
reported  the  affair  to  the  police.  Anton  and 
the  two  hoboes  were  arrested  on  a  charge  of 
larceny.  The  boy  had  said  that  the  two  ho- 
boes had  taken  the  money,  and  that  Anton  had 
had  no  share  in  it.  But  the  police  arrested 
him  anyway  as  an  important  witness,  and  they 
also  suspected  that  he  was  in  with  the  others. 
A  religious  man  for  whom  Anton  had  worked, 
and  who  regarded  him  as  immoral  but  honest, 
secured  a  lawyer  for  $25,  money  for  which 
Anton  wrote  a  letter  home. 

"I  was  approached  by  the  police,"  said  An- 
ton, "and  told  that  if  I  would  'tell  the  truth' 
I  would  be  released.  In  that  town  they  get 
so  much  for  every  conviction ;  and  if  the  police 
and  prosecuting  attorney  could  get  my  evi- 
dence against  the  other  two,  they  were  willing 
to  let  me  off.  But  I  didn't  see  it  that  way.  I 
considered  it  blackmail  on  their  part  to  threat- 
en me  with  prison  for  a  crime  I  had  not  com- 
mitted, unless  I  would  peach  on  the  others. 
Besides,  I  did  not  think  these  two  hoboes  had 
done  anything  they  ought  to  be  put  in  prison 
[55] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

for.  They  relieved  the  drunken  man  of  some 
money  that  was  doing  him  harm.  It  did  not 
seem  to  me  as  bad  a  crime  as  the  authorities 
were  guilty  of  in  their  action  against  me." 

The  judge  declared  that  there  was  not 
enough  evidence  against  Anton  to  indict  him, 
yet  it  would  be  well  to  hold  him  as  a  witness 
against  the  others.  This,  too,  seemed  to  our 
hero  an  arbitrary  and  unjust  proceeding.  In 
the  meantime,  he  was  in  jail  with  his  com- 
panions. Money  had  come  to  him  from  his 
family,  and  with  this  money  he  was  to  pay  the 
lawyer.  The  latter  visited  them  in  jail  and 
said  the  State's  attorney  had  agreed  to  make 
it  a  county  fine;  that  if  they  pleaded  guilty 
they  would  only  be  fined ;  if  not,  they  would 
be  kept  in  jail  until  October,  and  then  tried. 
Anton  and  his  companions  therefore  pleaded 
guilty,  and  Anton  paid  all  costs. 

"It  was  very  repulsive  to  me  to  do  this,"  he 
said.  *'I  was  weak  in  letting  them  blackmail 
me  in  this  way,  but  I  didn't  want  to  stay  in 
jj».il  so  long  and  then  have  a  good  chance  for 
from  two  to  five  years  in  the  penitentiary." 

For  three  days  before  the  money  came,  An- 
ton was  forced  to  work  on  the  county  road, 
chained  and  guarded  with  a  carbine.  When 
[56] 


Injustice  and  Love. 

he  was  released,  they  gave  him  nothing  for  his 
three  days'  work.  He  went  to  Fort  Worth 
and  tried  to  get  the  fine  remitted.  After  he 
had  paid  the  lawyer  and  the  costs  he  was  with- 
out money,  and  could  borrow  nothing  from  the 
judge,  the  lawyer  or  from  the  women  who  had 
performed  religious  ceremonies  in  jail.  But 
a  negro  loaned  him  $3 — which  he  afterwards 
paid  back — and  with  this  he  went  to  Weather- 
ford,  Texas,  where  he  found  a  job  and  worked 
hard  to  save  some  money,  with  revenge  in  his 
mind.  He  worked  ten  weeks  and  saved  $100. 
During  that  period  he  did  not  spend  a  cent  for 
beer  or  smoking  tobacco;  for  nothing  except 
the  bare  necessities. 

At  the  end  of  that  time  he  bought  a  suit  of 
clothes  ("you  can  do  nothing  with  Christian 
people  without  a  front,"  he  said)  and  returned 
to  Fort  Worth.  He  went  to  the  newspaper 
office,  and  offered  the  editor  forty  dollars  to 
print  his  story  of  the  arrest,  and  how  the  au- 
thorities had  urged  him  to  plead  guilty.  But 
the  editor  refused,  of  course.  "This  expe- 
rience," he  said,  "pushed  me  on  far  towards 
thinking.  I  began  to  believe  that  justice  is  a 
farce,  and  worse  than  a  farce." 

Anton  is  very  emotional  about  this  episode, 
[57] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

not  merely  because  it  formed  a  step  in  the  evo- 
lution of  his  social  opinions,  but  because  it 
marked  a  very  important  step  in  the  develop- 
ment of  his  love  affair.  "It  pushed  him  on," 
as  much  towards  "the  great  adventure,"  as  to- 
wards "thinking." 

Little  Maggie  had  been  in  love  with  him, 
as  she  admitted  to  me,  since  she  was  fourteen 
years  old.  She  was  a  house-maid  in  his  moth- 
er's family,  a  German  girl,  intelligent  and  ca- 
pable, full  of  life.  She  has  played  a  much 
more  important  part  in  her  husband's  life  than 
falls  to  the  lot  of  most  women,  great  as  that 
part  usually  is. 

"I  loved  him  at  once,"  she  said  to  me  one 
night,  as  she  and  I  were  sitting  over  her  excel- 
lent tea,  her  three  children  playing  happily 
on  the  kitchen  floor,  and  her  husband  away  on 
important  Union  business.  "I  used  to  pray 
God  to  protect  him  while  in  those  dreadful 
box-cars.  He  never  staid  in  Clinton  long,  and 
while  he  was  away  other  boys  paid  attention  to 
me,  and  I  kept  company  with  some  of  them. 
But  as  soon  as  Anton  turned  up  from  one  of  his 
tramps,  I  dropped  them  all  and  flocked  back  to 
him  at  once.  I  certainly  did  like  my  tramp. 
My  mother  tried  to  get  me  to  make  up  with 
[58] 


Injustice  and  Love. 

some  of  the  respectable  boys  who  wanted  to 
marry  me.  One  of  them  was  a  Minister  of  the 
Gospel,  but  I  couldn't  see  him  for  long." 

It  seems  that  the  vagabond  did  not  violently 
return  this  devoted  girl's  affection  for  a  long 
time.  He  was  busy  "seeing  the  world."  But 
when  he  was  in  jail  at  Fort  Worth  he  fell  to 
thinking  about  his  real  friends,  and  little  Mag- 
gie came  up  in  his  mind  and  senses.  He  was 
twenty-one  at  the  time,  and  had  often  been 
back  home  for  a  flying  trip.  During  these 
brief  visits,  he  had  seen  much  of  Maggie  and 
had  regarded  her  as  his  "steady."  But  now, 
in  jail,  he  fell  in  love  with  her,  for  the  first 
time.     He  put  the  case  to  me,  as  follows : 

"When  I  was  in  jail  I  was  very  lonesome 
and  homesick.  I  grieved  considerably,  and 
Maggie  came  up  always  in  my  thoughts.  She 
had  been  told  by  her  family  that  I  was  a  vaga- 
bond. She  thought  she  ought  to  suppress  her 
feelings  for  me  and  keep  company  with  some- 
body who  was  more  polite  and  steady.  She 
had  thrown  over  a  good  many,  for  my  sake,  but 
she  did  try  to  like  a  young  preacher  who  never 
smoked  or  drank  anything  stronger  than  lem- 
onade. I  thought  of  this  preacher,  now,  in 
jail,  and  I  did  not  like  the  idea  of  him.  So  I 
[59] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

wrote  Margaret  an  appealing  letter.  That 
letter  was  a  pathetic  confession.  I  never 
wrote  that  way  to  any  one  else,  and  never  but 
once  to  her.  Jail  and  thinking  had  made  me 
tender.  I  wrote  it  with  absolute  feeling. 
I  felt  it  was  a  crime  to  be  in  jail,  guilty 
or  not,  for  I  was  brought  up  that  way. 
So  I  wrote  to  her,  really  for  sympathy.  I 
asked  her  to  overcome  the  prejudice  against 
me,  I  promised  to  lead  a  better  life  and 
asked  her  to  be  my  wife,      j 

'When  she  got  the  letter  she  was  sick  in 
bed  with  pneumonia.  The  preacher  went  to 
see  her  every  day  and  took  her  flowers.  He 
never  swore,  but  he  chewed  gum.  She  was 
so  ill  that  she  thought  he  was  very  nice  and 
kind.  He  had  a  good  education,  but  no  wis- 
dom, executive  ability,  or  originality.  He 
was  a  man,  who,  while  very  much  in  love 
with  Margaret,  did  not  possess  the  strength 
or  wisdom  to  temper  his  feeling  with  modera- 
tion. That  is  necessary  if  you  want  the  wo- 
man to  return  your  love." 

"He  was  anxious  to  run  after  me,"  explained 
Margaret,  interrupting  her  husband's  narra- 
tive, "and  so  he  made  himself  less  attractive." 

Maggie  is  a  psychologist,  too. 
[60] 


Injustice  and  Love, 

"She  answered  my  letter,"  continued  Anton. 
"She  did  not  know  I  was  in  jail,  but  thought 
I  was  sick  in  a  hospital.  She  wrote  that  my 
letter  had  affected  her  deeply — so  much  so  that 
her  mother  and  the  preacher  noticed  it.  I 
think  they  read  the  letter,  but  she  won't  admit 
that.  Sick  as  she  was,  she  wrote  me,  and 
stated  that  she  was  keeping  company  with  the 
minister.  While  she  couldn't  love  him,  she 
might  learn  to  like  him,  and  she  would  al- 
ways be  a  dear  sister  to  me.  Her  letter  was 
pretty  strong,  and  it  made  me  lose  hope.  I 
suppose  I  did  not  know  much  about  the 
women,  then.  If  I  had,  I  would  have  known 
that  I  could  have  butted  in." 

And  he  did  "butt  in"  a  few  months  later, 
as  we  shall  see.  He  was  to  go  home  for  a 
double  triumph — the  great  one,  that  over  the 
minister,  and  a  minor  one  over  two  fellow 
workmen  who  had  treated  him  badly  when  he 
was  working  at  Fort  Worth,  Texas,  at  a  time 
previous  to  his  jail  experience  there. 

There  were  two  young  men  in  Clinton  who 
had  been  schoolmates  of  Anton's  and  had 
worked  fourteen  years  in  the  shop  where  An- 
ton had  his  first  job  in  the  wood-working  line. 
They  had  not  been  advanced  in  position  or 
[6i] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor, 

wages,  and  were  discontented,  so  they  wrote 
to  Anton  in  Texas,  and  asked  him  to  get  them  a 
job.  He  wrote  them  to  come,  but  when  they 
arrived,  he  found  it  was  not  so  easy  to  secure 
a  job;  for  they  were  far  from  being  good 
mechanics.  Anton  had  learned  more  about 
the  trade  in  two  or  three  years  of  knocking 
around  than  they  had  learned  in  fourteen  years 
in  Clinton.  He  was  then  being  paid  $i8  a 
week  for  nine  hours'  work  a  day,  while  they 
had  not  even  dreamed  of  a  nine  hour  day  and 
their  best  wage  had  been  $12  a  week.  They 
knew  that  Anton  had  shown  no  marked  abil- 
ity in  Clinton  and  they  thought  they  would 
do  at  least  as  well  as  he  when  they  went  to  a 
more  favorable  locality. 

As  he  could  find  them  nothing  at  Fort 
Worth,  he  advised  them  to  go  to  Dallas,  where 
the  opportunities  in  the  trade  were  much 
greater.  They  did  not  have  the  nerve  to  go 
alone :  they  were  borrowing  money  from  An- 
ton at  the  time,  and  wanted  to  "stick."  So 
they  asked  him  to  go  with  them.  "They  were 
home  people,"  said  Anton,  "and  so  I  picked 
a  quarrel  with  the  foreman  at  my  shop,  and  got 
fired." 

No  sooner  had  Anton  been  discharged,  than 
[62] 


Injustice  and  Love. 

one  of  his  friends  tried  for  the  vacant  place! 
"But  he  didn't  know  how  to  ask  for  anything," 
said  Anton,  "he  was  too  shy.  I  balled  him 
out,  but  overlooked  it  and  went  with  them  to 
Dallas." 

At  that  city  they  tried  for  a  job  every  day, 
sleeping  in  the  woods  at  night.  Each  man 
covered  a  certain  section  of  the  city,  and  they 
met  to  report  at  a  certain  hour.  On  the  second 
day  Anton  found  positions  for  two  men,  one  at 
$2.50  and  one  at  $2  a  day.  Both  he  and  the 
man  who  wanted  his  job  at  Dallas  worked  at 
i  the  moulding  machine,  and  these  jobs  there- 

fore fell  to  their  lot.  His  friend  claimed  the 
job  at  $2.50  a  day  and  Anton  agreed  to  it. 
It  was  with  the  understanding  that  he  should 
pay  25  cents  a  day  more  towards  supporting 
the  third  man  than  Anton  paid.     - 

The  two  went  to  work  in  the  cotton  gin  mill. 
As  Anton  had  had  some  experience  in  that 
variety  of  work,  he  made  an  impression  on 
the  foreman  and  soon  succeeded  in  getting  a 
job  for  the  third  man  at  $1.75  a  day.  But  this 
other  noble  companion  of  Anton's  was  dissatis- 
fied because  he  got  less  than  Anton  and  wanted 
to  quit.  So  Anton  fixed  it  with  the  foreman 
so  that  his  friend  might  have  his  own  place. 
[63] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

This  was  done,  and  Anton  looked  for  another 
job  for  himself,  and  soon  found  one  at  $i8  a 
week.  Then  both  of  his  friends  became  jeal- 
ous at  once. 

In  the  meantime,  they  were  writing  letters 
to  friends  in  Clinton,  boasting  that  they  got 
$i8  a  week.  Anton  finally  got  tired  of 
his  provincial  companions  and  went  alone 
to  Houston,  and  then  to  Galveston,  worked  a 
week,  and  then  back  to  Houston,  where  for  a 
time  he  was  out  of  a  job.  Here  he  had  an- 
other experience  with  man's  proverbial  grati- 
tude. He  came  across  a  person  whom  he  had 
met  on  the  street  months  before  in  Palestine, 
out  of  a  job  and  "bumming"  it.  He  was 
ragged,  "broke"  and  hungry.  Antoii  got 
him  a  breakfast,  a  drink,  and  a  job  in  the  same 
factory  where  he  was  working  at  the  time. 
This  fellow  was  a  good  mechanic  and  he  soon 
showed  the  foreman  that  only  one  man  was 
necessary,  so  Anton  was  discharged. 

When  Anton  met  this  man  later  at  Houston 
he  (Anton)  had  no  position  and  little  money, 
while  the  other  held  a  good  position.  "I 
thought  I  would  test  the  man,"  said  Anton. 
"So  I  asked  him  to  give  me  a  supper  and  a 
bed.  He  apologetically  said  I  could  have 
[64] 


Injustice  and  Love. 

supper  but  couldn't  stay  over  night.  I  went 
to  eat  with  him,  but  with  the  spirit  of  revolt 
I  insisted  on  paying  for  the  supper.  When  he 
saw  that,  he  got  friendly,  and  took  me  to  a  sa- 
loon. I  bought  him  whiskey  and  beer,  and 
then  before  a  big  crowd  of  hoboes  and  yeggs  I 
gave  him  a  d —  roasting,  gave  it  to  him  good 
and  plenty,  and  he  actually  cried." 

Anton  wandered  around  several  months  and 
after  having  his  jail  experience  in  Fort  Worth 
he  returned  to  Dallas,  where  his  so-called 
friends  were.  One  of  them  had  lost  his  job 
and  they  both  wanted  to  go  home.  They  did 
not  like  the  world,  found  it  cold  and  forbid- 
ding, and  thought  Clinton  was  big  enough  for 
them.     "And  it  was,"  said  Anton. 

He,  too,  longed  to  go  home.  He  thought 
he  had  lost  Maggie,  but  he  wanted  to  make 
sure,  and  besides  he  had  not  seen  his  family 
for  a  long  time.  So  the  three  "bummed"  their 
way  together.  Anton  wrote  to  his  brother, 
through  whom  he  had  learned  of  scandalous 
letters  his  "friends"  had  written  home  about 
him,  and  told  him  where  to  meet  them.  He 
wanted  someone  to  see  these  fellows  in  their 
ragged  shape,  hoboing  it,  so  that  it  might  be 
known  at  home  how  they  had  lied  in  their 
[65] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor, 

boasting  letters.  They  met,  and  the  brother 
''balled  them  out  for  fair,"  and  they  were 
disgraced  in  the  town. 

When  Anton  reached  his  father's  house,  he 
found  a  conspiracy  on  foot  to  get  him  married. 
His  father  was  succeeding  in  the  saloon  busi- 
ness, and  as  his  mother's  early  experience  with 
hardship  had  made  her  a  superb  economist, 
the  family  had  saved  some  money  and  conse- 
quently their  ideas  of  respectability  had  devel- 
oped. The  thought  of  their  son  Anton  lead- 
ing a  careless  and  godless  life  on  the  road  was 
disagreeable  to  these  good  people.  His 
mother  had  had  her  eye  on  little  Maggie  for 
a  long  time  as  a  good  wife  for  her  son.  The 
girl  was  very  industrious  and  this  represented 
all  the  virtues  in  the  eyes  of  the  old  lady. 

Anton  showed  plainly  that  he  had  been  "on 
the  bum."  His  clothes  were  "not  nice,"  as  he 
put  it.  The  first  thing  his  mother  did  was  to 
give  him  a  new  suit.  It  was  the  2nd  of  July, 
and  they  intended  he  should  make  a  good 
showing  at  the  Sunday  School  picnic  on  the 
historic  Fourth.  So  his  father  gave  him  $4, 
his  mother  $2,  one  brother  $2,and  his  other 
brother  $2.  His  sister  also  contributed  $2. 
With  $12  and  a  new  suit  he  felt  he  could  make 
[66] 


Injustice  and  Love. 

a.  magnificent  showing  on  the  4th.  When  the 
day  came,  the  entire  family  bundled  into  the 
old  carriage  and  rumbled  ofif  to  the  picnic. 

Maggie  was  at  the  picnic,  with  her  fiance, 
the  minister.  Anton  thought  her  more  beau- 
tiful and  desirable  than  ever,  but  he  felt  she 
was  not  for  him.  He  was  determined,  how- 
ever, to  show  that  he  was  alive  anjrway,  and 
that  he  came  very  near  being  "it,"  as  he  ex- 
plained it.  So  he  sang  a  German  song,  to 
the  great  delight  of  the  crowd,  and  then 
proved  himself  the  best  talker  in  the  place. 
He  had  had  a  wider  experience  in  life  than 
any  of  the  others,  and  his  anecdotes  were  full 
of  raciness,  his  jokes  were  lively  and  up-to- 
date.  Besides  he  was  looked  upon  as  a  little 
immoral  by  the  German  Lutherans,  and  this, 
if  nothing  else,  fastened  the  attention  of  every- 
body upon  him. 

He  addressed  no  word  to  Maggie,  but  he 
soon  perceived  that  she  was  listening.  This 
gave  him  confidence,  and  the  show  of  in- 
difference. He  began  to  see  that  the  feel- 
ing she  had  had  for  him  might  be  on  the  point 
of  coming  back.  Two  or  three  little  Ger- 
man girls,  who  admired  this  man  who  was  so 
well-dressed,  so  generous  in  his  way  of  treat- 
[67] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

ing  and  so  confident  and  varied  in  his  talk, 
asked  him  where  he  was  going  that  night. 
He  replied  in  a  loud  tone,  that  he  was  going 
to  the  German  ball. 

Maggie  heard  him,  and  decided  to  be  there, 
too.  In  the  meantime  Anton's  mother  had 
given  him  an  additional  $2,  so  Anton  turned 
up  at  the  ball,  where  the  admission  was  $1  and 
the  beer  free,  prepared  to  make  "an  awful 
showing,"  as  he  put  it. 

"I  had  a  certain  amount  of  wit,"  he  said, 
"was  a  good  dancer  and  attractive  to  their 
taste.  The  spirit  of  dignity  would  not  allow 
me  to  make  any  approach  to  Maggie." 

He  did,  however,  include  her  with  several 
other  girls  and  fellows  in  a  magnificent  and 
sweeping  invitation  to  go  with  him  to  a  wine 
room;  where,  at  Anton's  expense,  they  had 
beer  and  lunch. 

"This  made  me  a  big  fellow,"  he  said.  "It 
overcame  the  tendency  in  the  town  to  say  that 
I  was  broke.  They  guessed,  when  they  saw 
me  spend  the  coin." 

One  of  the  girls  passed  the  word  to  Anton 

that  Maggie  was  "all  right."     On  this  hint, 

the  young  tramp  asked  Maggie  for  a  dance; 

and  when  they  had  returned  to  the  hall  and 

[68] 


Injustice  and  Love, 

were  waltzing,  he  asked  Maggie  if  she  would 
write  a  different  letter  now  from  that  she  wrote 
three  or  four  months  ago. 

"The  coquettish  answer  came  so  quickly," 
he  said,  "that  I  was  surprised.  She  said  she 
did  not  need  to  write  now,  but  could  tell  me 
all  about  it.  So  I  escorted  her  home  from  the 
ball,  and  that  settled  it." 

The  next  day,  Sunday,  Maggie  had  an  en- 
gagement with  the  minister.  She  kept  it,  but 
brought  him  the  sad  news,  and  told  him  she 
would  be  his  sister.  In  the  evening,  Anton 
called,  and  was  received  very  coldly  by  her 
father  and  mother,  who  preferred  the  man 
who  did  not  swear,  drink  or  chew  anything 
but  gum. 

"But  now,"  said  Anton,  with  a  touch  of 
pride,  "they  think  I'm  all  right.  When  I 
smoke  in  the  house  now,  her  old  father  says  he 
used  to  be  just  as  bad,  and  when  I  drink,  he 
says,  'Boys  will  be  boys — that  was  the  way 
with  me.'  Now  they  are  interested  in  me, 
they  cannot  see  anything  bad  in  what  I  do." 

A  few  months  later,  Anton  and  Maggie 
were  married.     When  he  went  for  the  mar- 
riage license,  he  did  not  have  a  cent  in  his 
pocket,  or  anywhere  else.     They  lived,  at  first, 
[69] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

with  his  parents,  but  soon  Anton  had  a  chance 
to  go  into  the  saloon  business. 

"A  brewery  was  interested  in  me,"  he  said. 
"As  I  was  talkative,  and  had  met  many  men 
and  knew  how  to  get  along  with  them,  they 
thought  I  would  make  good,  if  I  did  not  give 
away  too  many  drinks." 

He  started  in  a  business  that  had  been  closed 
up  six  months,  and  for  which  he  had  to  drum 
up  a  new  trade.  The  first  month  he  ran  $20 
behind,  the  second  month  he  made  $60  over 
all,  and  the  third  month  he  cleared  over  $125. 
He  understood  the  tramps  and  rough  element 
and  knew  how  to  treat  them.  On  the  night 
his  son  Alfred  was  born,  there  was  a  very 
rough  crowd  in  the  saloon,  headed  by  a  desper- 
ate fighter,  a  bull-headed  Andrew.  Anton 
made  them  a  little  speech,  told  them  about  the 
great  occasion,  and  said  he  would  treat  them 
to  music,  cigars  and  cock-tails  until  midnight, 
with  the  understanding  that  if  there  should  be 
a  row,  they  would  abide  by  his  decision. 
They  drank  a  gallon  of  whiskey  and  half  a 
barrel  of  beer  and  then  began  eating  the 
glasses.     But  there  was  no  fighting. 

"The  news  that  I  could  manage  a  bunch  like 
that    traveled    like    fire,"    said    Anton.     "I 
[70] 


Injustice  and  Love. 

made  an  impression  on  the  brewers,  and  the 
biggest  toughs  in  town  began  to  respect  me.  I 
had  learned  to  deal  with  men  on  the  road, 
and  it  helped  me  in  the  saloon  business  just 
as  it  helps  me  now  in  my  trades-union  ac- 
tivity." > 

A  certain  kind  of  rough  delicacy  is  a  qual- 
ity marked  in  Anton's  character.  The  brewer 
was  a  stingy  fellow  who  never  wanted  to  treat, 
and  who  insisted  on  having  only  his  own  beer 
sold.  That  was  a  handicap  to  Anton,  for  he 
often  was  forced  to  say  that  he  did  not  have 
the  beer  called  for.  One  day  this  rich  brewer 
dropped  into  the  saloon  when  there  were  fif- 
teen or  sixteen  men  there,  drinking. 

"He  bought  a  bottle  of  beer,"  said  Anton, 
"and  treated  me.  I  felt  sore  that  he  didn't 
call  up  the  boys,  so  that  I  could  introduce  him 
as  a  good  fellow  and  help  the  business.  So 
I  treated  the  crowd  and  said,  sarcastically, 
'Mr. — 's  brewery  cannot  afford  to  buy.'  This 
galled  him  so  that  he  spent  ten  dollars  in  treat- 
ing, but  when  the  boys  were  gone,  he  called 
me  down  hard.  But  a  friend  of  his,  who  was 
with  him,  said  I  was  right  commercially." 

Soon  after  the  business  was  recognized  as  a 
success,  a  young  fellow,  son  of  the  widow  who 
[71] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

owned  the  saloon,  wanted  to  get  hold  of  it. 
So  his  mother  raised  the  rent  on  Anton,  who, 
understanding  the  reason  for  it,  got  angry  and 
refused  to  renew  his  lease.  Repentance  came 
almost  immediately,  but  it  was  then  too  late, 
and  he  was  again  out  of  a  job.  And  now  he 
had  a  wife  and  child.  He  had  the  satisfac- 
tion, however,  of  knowing  that  the  business 
soon  ran  down  and  that  the  widow  went  bank- 
rupt. 

Anton  was  forced  to  go  back  to  the  old  fur- 
niture factory,  at  $1.50  a  day.  It  was  very  irk- 
some to  him  to  work  for  so  little,  after  holding 
so  much  better  jobs  throughout  the  country. 
It  hurt  his  pride,  but  the  man  is  not  vain, 
and  he  recognized  it  as  a  necessity.  But  when 
summer  came,  and  work  was  slack,  he  was  laid 
off.  He  then  "got  the  fever  again,"  heard 
the  whistles  blow,  and  in  spite  of  his  wife  and 
child,  jumped  on  a  box-car  and  was  off  for  his 
last  tramp.  His  father  wanted  him  to  pay 
his  way,  but  this  seemed  to  Anton  a  pure  waste 
of  money. 

It  generally  takes  a  long  time  for  a  radical 

change  to  come  about  in  a  man — if  it  ever 

does.     Anton  loved  his  wife  and  certainly  the 

experience  of  marriage  tended  even  then  to 

[72] 


Injustice  and  hove. 

make  him  steadier.  But  it  needed  more  in- 
terests than  those  of  family  life  to  hold  him 
closely  in  one  place.  Those  interests  came  at 
a  later  time  in  Chicago :  and  in  this  combina- 
tion of  activities  which  have  made  him  an  in- 
tegral and  useful  member  of  his  society,  his 
family  plays  an  important  and  interesting 
part.  To  be  sure,  he  needed  a  job,  but  his 
going  South  just  then  was  perhaps  due  as 
much  to  the  remains  of  a  vagabond  tempera- 
ment as  to  necessity. 
I  He  left  Maggie  in  a  difficult  and  trying 

i         position.     During  the  time  that  Anton  was  in 
the  saloon  business  they  had  lived  in  a  little 
cottage  where  Af  red  was  born  and  where  they 
had  had  plenty.     With  her  skill  in  manage- 
ment, industry  and  intelligence,  they  had  been 
decidedly   well   off   and   quite   independent. 
But  now  she  and  her  child  had  to  live  again 
I        with  her  husband's  family.     And  she  had  the 
proverbial  difficulties  with  her  mother-in-law. 
g^         As  Anton's  father  became  more  prosperous  he 
p        grew  steadier  in  his  habits,  and  did  not  drink 
so  much.     But  Anton's  mother  kept  up  the 
habit  of  parsimony  even  though  it  had  ceased 
to  be  a  necessity.     She  was  practical  and  help- 
ful, gave  Anton  and  Maggie  the  clothes  they 
[73] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

needed  and  met  all  her  duties  and  the  neces- 
sities of  life.  But  life  had  been  so  hard  for 
her,  that  she  did  not  understand  the  pleasant 
aspect  of  things :  she  was  tyrannical  and  fussy 
and  gave  in  a  way  that  brought  no  pleasure,  as 
Maggie  put  it.  She  was  one  of  those  unfor- 
tunate women  who  do  their  duty  so  sadly  and 
constantly  that  they  receive  no  affection  from 
their  own  children  and  incur  the  active  dis- 
like of  all  others  who  are  connected  with  them. 
Whenever  Anton  sent  money  to  Maggie  from 
the  road,  his  mother  locked  it  up  for  safe  keep- 
ing and  doled  it  out  as  necessity  required. 
She  was  determined  that  nothing  should  be 
wasted.  Her  part  is  the  part  played  by  many 
a  poor  man  and  woman  who  have  been  the 
mainstay  of  a  family  but  even  thereby  have 
deprived  themselves  pathetically  of  most  of 
the  lovable  qualities. 


[74] 


CHAPTER  IV. 

The  Age  of  Reason. 

Anton's  last  trip  on  the  road  was  in  most 
respects  similar  to  its  predecessors.  He 
worked  at  anything  he  found :  waited  at  table, 
washed  dishes  in  boarding  houses,  worked  at 
his  trade,  gambled  and  "bummed";  spent  a 
night  at  ease  in  a  Pullman  car  which  was 
empty,  and  had  to  jump  in  the  morning  when 
the  train  was  going  fifteen  miles  an  hour; 
found  many  sympathetic  ladies,  and  few  good 
jobs ;  met  yeggs  and  hoboes,  and  imbibed  more 
of  the  philosophy  of  the  road.  An  anar- 
chistic miner,  with  a  gift  of  gab,  made  an  im- 
pression on  him.  But,  at  that  time.  Socialism 
and  anarchism  were  only  names  to  him.  The 
words  stirred  his  blood,  but  meant  little. 

A  hobo  always  wants  to  move  rapidly.  He 
has  no  engagements  and  no  place  to  go,  but 
he  is  always  in  a  hurry.  So  he  sometimes 
rides  on  the  trucks  of  the  passenger  trains, 
though  it  is  dangerous  and  uncomfortable. 
[75] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

In  the  box-cars,  he  is  more  comfortable 
than  the  bloated  millionaire  travelling  in  his 
parlor-car;  for  there  the  tramp  can  lie  down 
and  smoke.  But  he  is  generally  so  restless 
that  he  objects  to  the  slow  speed  of  the  freight 
train. 

So  Anton  hurried  on  from  place  to  place. 
The  thought  of  his  family  made  him  even 
more  restless  than  before.  He  was  anxious  to 
get  a  job,  but  when  once  secured  it  did  not 
seem  good  enough  for  him.  And,  indeed,  he 
was  now  forced  to  take  positions  which  he  for- 
merly would  have  sneered  at.  When  a  man 
wants  a  place  badly,  he  is  generally  paid 
less  than  when  he  is  indifferent.  At  New 
Orleans  he  was  hired  at  $1.50  a  day,  eleven 
hours,  by  the  same  foreman  who  had  formerly 
paid  him  $3  a  day;  and  now  he  was  a  skilled 
mechanic. 

"I  was  treated  with  this  same  generosity 
wherever  I  went,"  he  said.  "You  see,  I  was 
not  yet  a  Union  man." 

Yellow  fever  and  the  fear  of  quarantine 
drove  him  from  this  job.  While  "on  the 
bum"  he  was  introduced  by  a  policeman  to 
an  employer  as  a  man  out  of  work.  The  em- 
ployer volunteered  to  give  him  a  position  at 
[76] 


The  Age  of  Reason. 

$1.50  a  day,  for  11  hours'  work.  He  didn^t 
dare  to  refuse,  as  otherwise  the  policeman 
would  have  jailed  him  as  a  hobo. 

"Certainly,"  he  said,  sarcastically.  "It's 
work  I  want,  not  wages,  like  all  other  men." 

He  turned  up  at  the  mill  for  work,  "just 
for  curiosity,"  as  he  put  it;  worked  twenty 
minutes,  went  to  the  W.  C.  and  forgot  to  go 
back.  On  the  street  he  met  the  policeman, 
who  thought  he  possessed  a  gift  for  gab.  "I 
jollied  him  along,"  said  Anton,  "convinced 
him  that  I  was  a  good  fellow,  and  after  I  had 
listened  a  long  time  to  his  wit,  he  advised  me 
to  leave  town.  Instead,  I  went  into  a  saloon 
and  began  singing  to  a  lot  of  steamboat  men. 
For  this  I  was  arrested  as  a  disorderly  char- 
acter, and  taken  before  the  magistrate.  I 
made  my  plea  straight,  and  so  the  judge  felt 
I  was  a  hardened  criminal,  and  sentenced  me 
to  the  stone  pile.  I  ran  away,  but  was  caught 
and  served  my  ten  days.  The  law  doesn't  like 
music,  apparently.  But  it  is  hard  on  a  man 
to  have  to  remember  that  the  law  has  nerves. 
When  I  got  out,  I  jumped  on  the  night  Flyer 
and  as  we  pulled  out  I  saw  four  policemen 
watching  to  see  if  there  were  any  hoboes  on 
the  train.  I  yelled  the  most  insulting  things 
[77] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

I  could  think  of ;  we  were  going  at  full  speed, 
and  had  just  turned  around  a  block,  and  at  the 
curve  was  a  house  of  ill-fame  from  the  win- 
dows of  which  two  women  of  the  town  looked 
down  and  enjoyed  my  jokes.  They,  too,  hated 
the  police." 

As  the  train  passed  through  Whitecastle, 
Louisiana,  he  saw  the  large  sign  of  a  sash  and 
door  factory,  so  he  dropped  ofif,  to  try  for  a 
job.  The  first  man  he  met  was  an  outcast 
from  the  richest  family  in  Clinton.  *'He  was 
an  aristocrat,  and  when  at  home  used  to  run 
around  with  the  free  element  and  drink,"  said 
Anton.  "But  when  he  was  thrown  on  his  own 
resources  he  quit  the  booze  and  with  me  at 
Whitecastle,  he  drank  only  soda."  Through 
this  young  man  Anton  got  a  good  job  in  the 
sash  factory  and  was  enabled  to  send  money 
home,  but  after  a  few  weeks,  yellow  fever  be- 
came general  in  Louisiana,  and  the  factory 
shut  down.  A  shot-gun  quarantine  was  in 
force  and  Anton  found  himself  out  of  a  place 
and  unable  to  leave  town. 

Under  these  conditions,  all  he  could  do  was 

to  amuse  himself  and  wait.     Books  and  even 

newspapers  were  unknown  to  him.     He  did 

not  read  at  all.     At  a  later  time,  he  seems  to 

[78J 


The  Age  of  Reason. 

have  rejoiced  in  his  ignorance  of  classical  cul- 
ture. "My  mind  was  not  prejudiced,"  he 
said.  "I  was  not  mis-educated.  I  was  not 
burdened  with  a  common  school  education.  I 
was  unperverted  and  radical  ideas  could  take 
a  firm  hold  on  me." 

What  he  learned,  he  learned  from  experi- 
ence ;  and  his  experience  during  the  period  of 
quarantine  was  largely  that  of  a  town  loafer. 
He  "hung  around"  the  hotel  bar  and  billiard 
room  and  played  pool,  at  which  he  was  an  ex- 
pert. He  worked  about  the  hotel  and  that, 
with  what  he  could  make  at  pool,  gave  him  a 
living.  On  one  occasion  he  had  instructions 
from  his  backers  to  lose  the  game.  At  first, 
he  allowed  his  opponent  to  distance  him,  but 
the  boasting  of  the  latter  and  the  applause  of 
the  crowd  made  him  forget  that  his  backers 
wanted  him  to  lose;  and  he  won  by  a  close 
margin.  In  consequence,  he  received  only 
$2.50  out  of  the  $50  stakes,  and  all  the  sports 
were  down  on  him.  They  thought  he  had 
won  because  enough  "considerations"  had  not 
been  offered  him.  He  was  unable  to  secure 
another  game  during  his  stay  in  the  town. 
The  proprietor  of  the  hotel  gave  him,  how- 
ever, another  chance,  and  put  him  in  charge 
[79] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

of  a  saloon  that  was  patronized  by  negroes. 
"There,"  said  Anton,  "I  had  a  chance  to  make 
ten  dollars  a  day,  but  my  sympathy  got  the 
best  of  my  judgment.  It  was  easy  to  graft 
there  off  the  drinks,  polo,  lunch,  showing 
favors  about  the  women,  etc.,  but  my  lack  of 
courage  and  my  sympathy  for  the  coon  made 
it  impossible  for  me  to  succeed,  although  I 
was  very  anxious  to  send  money  home." 

This  man  never  expresses  ordinary  snap- 
shot condemnation  of  the  ordinary  immoral- 
ity. It  is  in  his  eyes  so  closely  connected  with 
property  and  the  class-standards  developed 
from  it,  that  moral  indignation  seems  out  of 
place  to  him.  But  when  it  came  to  the  point, 
he  was  unable  to  do  the  human  harm  to  some- 
body that  cheating  or  theft  involves. 

The  morning  after  the  first  frost,  the  quar- 
antine was  raised.  There  was  a  general  jubi- 
lee and  Anton  sang  songs  and  made  a  speech. 
Then  he  took  a  train,  on  his  way  home,  but 
as  he  was  broke  and  hungry,  he  dropped  off 
at  the  first  town,  for  a  bite.  A  woman  put 
him  to  work  cutting  wood ;  he  sawed  wood  for 
lyz  hours;  she  then  called  him  to  breakfast 
which  consisted  of  2  biscuits,  a  cup  of  coffee, 
and  a  little  bacon. 

[80] 


The  Age  of  Reason. 

"  I  was  mad  enough  to  choke  her,"  he  said. 
"She  then  asked  if  I  had  enough.  'Too 
much,'  I  replied.  'Enough  to  last  me  a 
week.'    I  avoided  wood  piles  after  that." 

This  lady  was  a  Christian  and  wealthy. 
The  next  morning  Anton  begged  a  meal,  at 
the  house  of  some  working  people.  The 
woman  cooked  for  him  some  sweet  potatoes, 
plenty  of  bacon,  two  eggs,  two  or  three  cups 
of  coffee,  butter  and  biscuits.  The  contrast 
impressed  him.  On  the  basis  of  a  full  stom- 
ach he  found  a  planing  mill  and  began  to 
think  the  world  was  his  again.  The  propri- 
etor hired  him  at  $2  a  day.  Anton  worked 
there  three  months  and  sent  home  $45  of  his 
wages.  On  Xmas  day  he  spent  two  dollars 
in  fruit  and  candy  and  took  the  present  to  the 
family  of  the  working  woman  who  had  given 
him  so  good  a  breakfast  when  he  was  in  need. 
He  continued  his  way  home,  but  at  Belleville, 
Illinois,  came  one  of  his  most  unpleasant  ex- 
periences. It  was  winter  and  the  snow  was 
deep.  He  was  sleeping  in  a  rolling  mill,  over 
the  boilers.  The  men  in  the  mill  thought 
they  would  have  some  fun,  and  took  some 
waste,  saturated  it  with  oil  and  lighted  it. 
The  heat  scared  him  and  awakening  suddenly 
[81] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

he  thought  the  whole  building  was  on  fire. 
Without  taking  his  shoes,  which  he  had  used 
as  a  pillow,  he  jumped  down,  eight  feet,  and 
rushed  out  in  the  snow,  bare-foot.  He  went 
into  four  different  stores  in  the  town,  but  they 
all  refused  him  shoes.  Finally  in  another 
rolling  mill  he  secured  some  shoes  and  a  place 
to  sleep.  In  the  morning  when  the  crews 
were  changed,  he  was  discovered  asleep  by  the 
son  of  the  superintendent.  He  and  his  father 
landed  on  the  sleeping  hobo  and  nearly 
pounded  the  life  out  of  him,  "for  no  reason  at 
all." 

"I  had  a  strong  feeling,"  said  Anton,  "that 
I  ought  to  kill  them.  I  started  to  do  it  twice, 
but  I  thought  of  my  wife  and  child.  The 
employees  put  me  wise  and  I  could  easily  have 
settled  them,  but  my  courage  failed  me.  I 
ought  to  have  done  it.  I  am  still  sorry  that 
I  didn't  do  it.  When  I  got  home,  I  told  my 
friends  I  had  fallen  off  the  train,  to  account 
for  my  bruises." 

That  was  Anton's  last  hobo  experience.  His 
wife  "seemed  good"  to  him,  when  he  returned; 
and  although,  at  times  since  then,  he  has  heard 
the  whistles  blow  and  his  blood  has  been 
stirred  with   the   strange   eloquence   of   the 

[82] 


The  Age  of  Reason. 

sordid  road,  the  attraction  has  never  been 
strong  enough  to  make  him  break  loose. 

"I  returned  to  Clinton,"  he  said,  "a  family 
man  and  a  sceptic,  though  not  yet  a  free- 
thinker. Hobo-life  and  experience  with  men 
has  taken  the  old  faith  out  of  me,  but  I  had 
not  yet  got  any  philosophy  as  a  substitute." 

His  first  duty  was  to  find  a  job.  He  was 
forced  to  "humiliate  himself"  by  asking  for  a 
position  in  the  old  factory  where  no  boy  could 
learn  a  trade.  The  foreman  referred  him  to 
%  the  owner;  he  had  been  discharged  so  often 
"  and  had  made  so  much  trouble  that  he  would 
not  hire  him  on  his  own  responsibility.  The 
owner  gave  Anton  a  lecture,  told  him  that 
since  his  father  and  brothers  had  worked  there 
he  (Anton)  ought  to  settle  down.  Incident- 
ally, he  spoke  of  his  own  brother,  who  was 
running  for  congressman.  Anton  understood, 
and  promised  to  settle  down.  "I  wanted  a 
job,"  he  said,  "but  it  didn't  influence  my 
vote." 

Maggie  was  overjoyed  when  she  found  that 
Anton  had  a  position  in  the  town,  although  his 
wages  were  only  $1.35  a  day.  They  moved 
into  a  hut  with  a  little  yard  where  they  could 
plant  their  own  potatoes.  The  floor  in  the 
[83] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

kitchen  slanted,  but  they  paid  only  $3  a  month 
rent. 

"I  made  it  look  cute  ant!  nice,  anyway," 
said  Maggie.  And  I  can  well  believe  her. 
For  the  first  time  I  had  the  pleasure  of  tak- 
ing my  Sunday  dinner  with  her,  Anton  and 
the  children  (there  were  three  of  them,  then; 
this  was  several  years  later  than  this  point  in 
the  story),  I  was  at  once  struck  with  the 
cleanliness  and  well-being  of  the  entire  house- 
hold. Maggie  had  no  one  to  help  her;  she 
did  all  the  cooking  and  house-work,  kept  her 
children  healthy  and  perfectly  clean,  the 
house  as  neat  as  her  snow-white  apron,  the 
garden  productive  and  attractive,  and  set  as 
good  a  plain  table  as  has  been  my  good  fortune 
to  know.  In  addition  to  all  this,  she  did  out- 
side washing  and  did  it  well  (for  this  also  I 
can  vouch,  for  she  did  mine !) .  Her  work  did 
not  seem  to  oppress  her  in  the  least;  she  al- 
ways had  plenty  of  temperament  left  over  to 
take  an  interest  in  her  husband,  his  friends 
and  affairs,  and  to  do  a  little  reading  on  her 
own  account.  She  often  went  out  to  socials, 
and  sometimes  ran  into  the  house  of  a  neigh- 
bor for  a  good  gossip.  So,  when  she  told  me 
that  the  little  hut  in  Clinton  where  the  family 
[84] 


The  Age  of  Reason. 

lived  for  a  year  was  clean  and  neat,  I  readily 
believed  her. 

Anton  worked  steadily  in  the  old  shop  for 
a  year.  It  was  a  happy,  domestic  time.  A 
little  girl  was  born,  and,  on  his  small  wages, 
everything  went  well.  The  energy  he  had 
saved  from  the  strenuousness  of  life  on  the 
road,  went  into  more  definite  intellectual  life. 
"The  spirit  of  protest" — a  phrase  of  which 
he  is  very  fond,  grew  stronger  in  him.  He 
regretted  that  there  were  no  unions  in  the 
town,  in  his  trade  of  woodworking,  which  was 
the  largest  industry  in  the  place.  But  his  or- 
ganizing talent  had  not  yet  developed;  there 
had  been  no  opportunity  for  it. 

There  was  an  old  man  named  Greenhill 
working  in  the  factory.  Years  before  he  had 
met  Robert  Ingersoll  in  Chicago  and  had  been 
much  impressed.  IngersoU's  clear,  though 
limited  and  narrow  human  scepticism,  had 
struck  old  Greenhill  as  the  last  word.  With 
this  as  a  starter,  he  began  to  read  "radical" 
books.  He  subscribed  to  the  Free  Thought 
Magazine  and  Truth  Seeker,  and  Tom  Paine's 
Age  of  Reason  was  his  Bible. 

Greenhill  saw  that  Anton  was  ripe  for  these 
ideas,  and  at  odd  times  in  the  shop,  he  under- 
[85] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

took  the  younger  man's  education.  The  little 
thing  that  started  the  ball  rolling  was  a  copy 
of  The  Truth-Seeker.  Greenhill  dropped  it, 
in  the  '  W.  C,"  "accidentally  on  purpose,"  and 
Anton  read  it  there.  It  contained  a  cartoon 
attacking  the  principle  of  the  Spanish- Ameri- 
can War.  As  Anton  was  opposed  to  the  war, 
he  subscribed  to  the  magazine.  In  this  way 
it  was  that  he  discovered  Greenhill  to  be  a 
"free-thinker,"  and  their  intimacy  began. 

"It  was  rather  hard  on  Maggie,  at  first," 
said  Anton.  "All  our  folks  were  Lutherans, 
and  she  thought  I  was  going  to  the  devil. 
But  she  tolerated  it.  I  got  the  magazine 
every  week  and  Greenhill  began  coming  to 
the  house.  We  talked  about  astronomy  and 
Darwin,  and  it  was  exciting,  I  can  tell  you, 
to  begin  to  get  some  little  idea  of  the  way 
things  really  are.  Greenhill  felt  most  people 
were  still  monkeys.  Finally  he  showed  me 
Tom  Paine's  Age  of  Reason.  This  was  the 
first  book  I  ever  read  through,  and  I  read  this 
book  many  times.  I  used  to  read  it  aloud  to 
Maggie  in  the  evening,  and  she  got  as  much 
interested  as  I  was.  We  referred  to  the  Ger- 
man Bible  and  found  the  absurdities  and  con- 
tradictions that  Paine  pointed  out.  I  loaned 
[86] 


The  Age  of  Reason. 

it  once  to  a  Catholic  who  liked  it  so  much 
that  he  never  returned  it.  I  wish  I  had  the 
old  book  now.  My  father  thought  it  was 
awful. 

"I  began  to  hate  the  Church  and  its  doc- 
trines. I  never  let  an  opportunity  pass  to  hurt 
the  feelings  of  the  people  in  that  God-ridden 
town.  There  was  a  young  fellow  in  the  fac- 
tory who  was  studying  to  be  a  minister.  He 
ran  his  machine  next  to  mine  and  we  used  to 
argue  while  at  work.  He  tried  to  argue  me 
out  of  free  thought,  but  I  had  him  skinned  to 
death.  I  laughed  at  him,  and  it  hurt  him. 
I  hated  him  because  of  my  disappointment; 
for  it  was  a  disappointment  to  have  everything 
go  up  in  smoke.  I  told  him  it  was  the  God- 
idea  that  had  kept  the  workers  in  darkness  and 
ignorance  and  poverty.  Maggie  followed  me 
in  these  ideas  like  a  child."         ^ 

"No!"  said  Maggie,  indignantly,  "I  led  the 
way." 

"The  world,"  continued  Anton,  without 
paying  any  attention  to  his  wife's  remark,  "is 
dominated  by  fear;  and  religion  is  its  strongest 
weapon.  Tom  Paine  proves  that.  He  goes 
about  it  in  such  a  mild  way:  it  is  grand.  He 
does  not  get  excited,  but  he  is  uncompromis- 
[87] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor.     • 

ing.  *I  believe  in  one  God  and  only  one,'  he 
starts  out.  '  I  have  hopes  of  happiness  be- 
yond this  life.'  As  for  me,  I  have  hopes  of 
happiness  in  remaining  dead.  My  hopes  are 
so  strong  that  they  overcome  the  fear  of  not 
remaining  dead.  It  is  immaterial  whether  I 
die  soon,  or  late.  I  am  all  right  as  long  as 
the  factory  whistle  doesn't  blow;  but  when  it 
blows  and  it  is  time  to  go  home,  I  am  miser- 
able." 

"That  is  what  he  calls  satire,"  said  Maggie. 

Whenever  Anton  talks  philosophy,  and  he 
does  so  constantly,  he  becomes  merry.  He 
likes  expression  for  its  own  sake.  On»Mag- 
gie's  remark,  he  said,  stroking  his  son's  head: 

"Alfred  is  not  a  sentimentalist,  like  Mag- 
gie. He  is  cold-blooded  and  stands  by  his 
father  instead  of  his  mother." 

"My  passion  for  investigation  along  eco- 
nomic lines  was  strong  at  that  time,"  continued 
Anton,  "and  I  became  interested  in  Socialism. 
I  met  a  Jew  who  ran  a  second-hand  shop — a 
man  who  would  rob  his  next  door  neighbor. 
He  was  a  Socialist  soap-box  orator.  I  used 
to  listen  to  him  argue  Socialism,  for  at  that 
time  I  was  a  listener  and  not  a  Butinsky.  I 
had  very  little  to  say,  but  I  was  very  vindic- 
[88] 


The  Age  of  Reason. 

tive  when  I  met  a  religious  man.  As  a  boy 
I  had  been  very  religious,  and  now  I  was  as 
extreme  in  the  other  direction.  The  foreman 
tried  to  lecture  me  and  show  me  the  evil  of 
my  ways.  Also,  a  young  minister  used  to 
advise  me  to  read  something  useful,  such  as 
bookkeeping,  instead  of  Tom  Paine. 

"But  I  didn't  care  about  them.  I  liked  old 
Greenhill,  although  he  was  a  narrow-minded 
man.  His  time  was  devoted  to  the  interest  of 
killing  God,  and  this  tended  to  side-track  him. 
He  was  also  a  free-lover  and  a  subscriber  to 
Lucifer.  He  had  been  married  three  or  four 
times.  He  was  a  good  mechanic,  and  if  he 
had  not  had  these  ideas  he  might  have  been  a 
foreman.  Foremen  are  generally  ignoram- 
uses. They  know  nothing  about  philosophy, 
sociology,  or  economics.  They  feel  it  an 
honor  to  be  in  the  Church,  and  are  nearly  all 
religious." 

Anton,  on  being  offered  30  cents  a  day 
more,  went  to  another  factory  in  the  same 
town,  and  moved  to  another  house,  near  his 
new  working  place.  He  grew  "more  talka- 
tive," as  he  expressed  it,  among  the  workmen. 
He  began  to  feel  his  intellectual  superiority 
to  the  rank  and  file,  and  tried  to  think,  and 
[89] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

to  teach  them  something  about  the  conditions 
of  labor.  He  soon  had  the  satisfaction  of 
"breeding  discontent  among  them,"  and  the 
foreman  began  to  look  upon  him  as  a  nui- 
sance. One  day  he  had  a  big  boil  on  his  neck, 
and  Maggie  was  ill  with  cramps  in  her  feet. 
So  Anton  did  not  reach  the  shop  till  noon,  and 
was  discharged.  This  he  felt  to  be  unjust, 
after  they  had  induced  him  to  leave  his  old 
place  and  go  to  the  expense  of  moving.  He 
realized  his  being  late  was  only  an  excuse. 
He  had  done  his  work  well — he  was  now  a 
fair  mechanic — but  he  talked  too  much 
among  the  men.  ^-^ 

Anton  determined  that  he  would  have  a 
verbal  understanding  with  his  employer. 
The  desire  to  "ball  people  out"  with  whom 
he  had  quarreled  is  very  strong  in  this  expres- 
sive workingman.  So  one  Saturday  he  waited 
for  the  employer  on  the  road,  and,  on  meeting 
him,  insisted  that  he  should  explain  the  dis- 
charge. He  did  not  reply,  but  swore  out  a 
warrant  of  assault  and  battery  against  Anton, 
who  was  taken  before  an  old  justice  of  the 
peace. 

"The  justice  was  satisfied,"  said  Anton, 
"that  the  charge  of  assault  and  battery  was 
[90] 


The  Age  of  Reason. 

not  justified.  He  sympathized  with  me,  but 
this  man  was  a  boss,  and  part  owner  of  the 
factory.  So  he  made  me  sign  a  document 
pledging  myself  not  to  molest  the  boss,  and  he 
fined  me  $5  besides.  My  father  was  very 
angry,  and  wanted  me  to  prosecute  the  man, 
but  my  respect  for  the  law  was  already  so  low 
that  I  gave  the  idea  no  consideration ;  but  the 
next  day  I  went  by  the  employer's  fine  house. 
It  was  Sunday,  and  he  was  sitting  on  his  ver- 
anda. I  balled  him  out  for  fair.  I  talked 
so  loud  that  all  the  neighbors  could  hear.  I 
explained  to  him  how  he  took  the  bread  out 
of  the  mouths  of  women  and  children.  I  told 
him  I  was  going  to  Davenport  to  work,  and 
that  if  he  queered  me  there  by  a  boycott  I 
would  kill  him.  I  am  now  boycotted  in  Clin- 
ton. I  could  not  get  a  job  there  to-day,  be- 
cause of  my  agitation  years  ago."      c 

After  ten  or  twelve  days  in  Davenport, 
where  he  could  obtain  no  satisfactory  job,  he 
returned  to  Clinton,  with  the  determination 
to  take  his  family  to  Chicago.  That  would 
give  him  a  larger  field,  and  he  knew  that  he 
could  get  nothing  in  Clinton.  It  was  excit- 
ing, too,  the  idea  of  settling  in  the  big  city. 

So  it  was  decided,  and  this  decision  made 
[91] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor, 

Anton's  mother  very  anxious  that  his  little 
girl  should  be  at  once  baptized,  before  she 
was  beyond  the  reach  of  salvation,  in  distant 
Chicago.  Maggie  wanted  to  please  the  old 
lady,  and  so  Anton  consented,  somewhat 
against  his  principles,  and  he  went  to  engage 
the  minister,  a  German  Lutheran  preacher. 

"He  invited  me  into  his — studio,  I  believe 
he  called  it.  I  told  him  my  mission.  He 
asked  me  my  name,  place  of  birth,  names  of 
parents,  and  what  Church  I  belonged  to.  I 
was  quick  and  proud  to  tell  him  I  belonged 
to  none.  Why?'  he  asked.  *I  don't  believe 
in  it,'  I  said.  He  was  horrified  and  shocked, 
arose  and  said  he  knew  I  must  be  a  bad  man. 
I  told  him  he  had  no  reason  to  think  so.  He 
said  he  had  every  reason.  'You  are  a  damned 
liar,'  I  said,  in  his  own  studio,  where  he 
might  have  studied,  if  he  had  been  so  dis- 
posed. Then  he  wanted  to  know  why  I  de- 
sired to  have  the  child  baptized.  *I  am  more 
tolerant  than  you,'  I  said.  *I  want  it  baptized 
to  please  my  mother.' 

"I  had  started  to  go,  but  he  asked  me  back 

again  and  tried  to  argue  with  me.     He  turned 

over  many  pages  in  the  Bible,  and  I  pointed 

out  the  contradictions,   as   Tom   Paine   had 

[92] 


The  Age  of  Reason. 

taught  me,  and  laughed.  He  was  shocked, 
but  talked  three  mortal  hours.  I  admired  his 
perseverance.  He  asked  who  was  the  god- 
father, and  when  he  found  that  Maggie's 
father  was  a  Christian  Scientist,  he  objected, 
but  the  objection  was  not  sustained.  At  first 
he  refused  to  come,  but  when  I  said  I  would 
get  an  English  preacher,  he  consented  to  help 
us  out. 

"The  night  of  the  christening  there  was  a 
little  beer  in  the  house,  and  the  wife  was  on 
eggs  all  evening  for  fear  I  would  start  an  ar- 
gument with  the  preacher.  I  wanted  to  stand 
by  the  beer  keg  and  drink  as  a  protest,  but 
Maggie  would  do  anything  to  avoid  trouble. 
After  the  ceremony,  the  preacher  called  me 
out,  for  a  talk.  I  gave  him  mother's  money 
for  the  christening — $3.  He  was  pleased  and 
gave  me  a  book  called  'The  Word  of  God  and 
His  Enemies/  I  suggested  his  taking  along 
with  him  Tom  Paine's  Age  of  Reason,  but  he 
said  he  would  just  as  lief  have  the  devil  in  his 
house.  I  remarked  that  the  devil  is  more 
tolerant  than  God,  and  always  has  been.  I 
was  too  prejudiced  even  to  read  his  book." 


[93] 


CHAPTER  V. 

Trade-  Un  to  n  is  t. 

Immediately  after  the  christening,  Anton 
went  to  Chicago  alone,  to  find  a  job,  and  estab- 
lish a  home  for  his  family.  He  took  with 
him  his  entire  capital,  consisting  of  one  dollar 
and  thirty-five  cents.  He  found  employment 
the  first  day  at  Carbon  Brothers,  Union  and 
Twenty-seventh  streets.  He  was  then  re- 
duced to  thirty-five  cents,  had  no  money  for 
board  or  for  tools.  They  put  him  on  the 
molding  sticker,  which  is  his  favorite  job. 
Working  next  him  was  a  Union  man,  who  did 
not  ask  him  to  join  the  Union,  and  paid  no 
attention  to  him.  He  was  apparently  afraid 
that  Anton  would  make  a  showing  and  was 
jealous.  This  man,  as  Anton  afterwards  dis- 
covered, was  a  prominent  "lusher"  in  the 
Union,  and  thought  more  of  himself  and  of 
whiskey  than  of  the  good  of  the  cause.  On 
this,  as  on  many  other  previous  occasions,  An- 
ton had  the  opportunity  to  reflect  on  the  lack 
[94] 


Trade-  Unionist. 

of  initiative  in  so  many  Union  men.  Up  to 
the  present  point  in  the  narrative,  he  had 
never  been  asked,  or  in  any  other  way  influ- 
enced, to  join  the  Union.  He  is  deeply  im- 
pressed with  the  need  of  awakening  the  work- 
ers to  their  own  interests,  partly  through  dis- 
sipating their  narrow  selfishness  and  cow- 
ardice, and  partly  through  general  education. 
Anton  worked  in  a  shop  for  several  months  at 
$1.75  a  day,  and  during  all  this  time  no  Union 
man  approached  him,  although  he  desired  to 
join.  He  was  bitterly  anxious  now  to  im- 
prove his  wages.  He  paid  $4.50  a  week  for 
his  board,  and  sent  $5  every  week  to  Maggie. 
This  was  just  squeezing  along,  and  he  felt 
that  if  he  could  get  better  wages  and  bring  his 
family  to  Chicago,  life  would  be  much  richer. 
An  opportunity  to  join  the  Union  finally 
came.  It  was  after  a  long  strike,  and  a  stick- 
er-hand was  needed  in  a  South  Chicago  fac- 
tory, which  was  a  Union  shop.  He  went  to 
work  at  $2.50  a  day,  with  the  understanding 
that  he  should  join  the  Union.  His  wages 
were  reduced  to  $2.25  by  the  foreman,  as  he 
was  not  yet  a  first-class  mechanic.  He  could 
not  have  been  reduced  below  $2  a  day,  as  that 
was  the  Union  minimum.  His  first  wages 
[95] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

went  as  the  entrance  fee  to  the  Union.  Con- 
sequently, he  was  very  hard  up  for  a  week  or 
two,  but  from  the  start  he  was  an  enthusiastic 
Union  man.  From  that  time  to  the  present, 
a  period  of  about  seven  years — he  has  worked 
with  fair  steadiness  and  at  good  wages,  aver- 
aging very  much  higher  than  anything  he  had 
received  before ;  until  now  he  has  a  job  which 
he  has  held  for  three  years,  at  $3.50  a  day. 
The  Union  helped  him  in  many  ways,  as  we 
shall  see,  but  perhaps  as  important  a  way  as 
any  was  to  help  to  steady  him,  to  keep  him 
feeling  a  part  of  a  society  and  not  too  much 
of  an  individual.  An  increasing  family  and 
greater  circumspectness  tended,  of  course,  in 
the  direction  of  steadiness,  but  the  Union  was, 
aside  from  the  material  benefit,  an  important 
aid  in  his  moral  hygiene.    ' 

As  soon  as  possible,  he  called  Maggie  and 
the  children  from  Clinton  to  a  little  flat  of 
four  rooms  on  Nineteenth  street,  which  he 
hired  for  $9  a  month;  and  they  became  defi- 
nitely a  part  of  Chicago  life,  Anton  at  once 
engaging  with  steadily  increasing  interest  in 
the  affairs  of  the  Union.  At  the  same  time 
he  became  a  more  effective,  if  not  for  some 
time  a  more  peaceful,  man  in  the  shop.  In 
[96] 


Trade-Unionist. 

fact,  his  peaceableness  has  never  been  marked. 
He  can  be  very  sweet  and  generous,  but 
neither  in  temperament  nor  in  philosophy  has 
he  the  virtue  of  patience  and  endurance  of 
what  he  deems  unjust  or  churlish. 

He  was  assistant  "straw"  boss  in  the  shop, 
which,  as  he  put  it,  "is  next  thing  to  nothing," 
but  which  nevertheless  marked  an  advance  in 
his  trade  and  the  consideration  with  which  he 
was  regarded.  The  foreman  was  "a  con- 
ceited Irishman,  generally  drunk."  Once, 
when  he  was  off  for  two  weeks,  Anton  was  put 
in  charge  of  his  department,  at  wages  of  $2 
a  day.  Another  department  foreman  re- 
ceived $2.75  a  day.  "He  was,"  said  Anton, 
"an  obedient  slave  to  the  interests  of  the 
concern.  If  a  man  went  to  the  toilet  he 
would  go  after  him  and  make  him  hurry. 
He  was  not  a  member  of  the  Union,  and  had 
no  interest  in  anything  except  the  work  and 
his  wages.  He  was  a  narrow-minded  man. 
I  had  no  use  for  this  kind  of  foreman,  but  I 
had  to  deal  with  him  when  I  was  in  charge  of 
the  other  department.  One  day  he  told  the 
superintendent  that  some  things  had  not  been 
properly  made,  and  put  the  blame  on  me.  The 
superintendent  started  to  raise  Cain,  and  I 
[97] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

flew  off  the  handle  and  swore.  The  superin- 
tendent pulled  off  his  coat,  and  I  got  out  of 
my  overalls.  Then  he  discharged  me.  But, 
when  he  got  down  stairs,  he  was  cooler,  and 
evidently  wanted  me  to  ask  to  be  allowed  to 
come  back.  *You  ought  to  apologize,'  he 
said ;  but  I  could  not  see  it  that  way.  I  told 
him  he  ought  to  treat  all  men  with  considera- 
tion, and  that  there  was  as  much  logic  in  mine 
as  in  his.  When  he  found  I  wouldn't  stay, 
he  wrote  me  a  good  letter  to  a  factory  on  the 
North  Side,  highly  recommending  me.  But 
that  shop  had  no  Union  scale,  and  was  a  ten- 
hour  shop.     So  I  didn't  go  there." 

He  was  out  of  a  job  for  several  weeks. 
Every  day  he  went  to  the  Union  headquar- 
ters, looking  for  work.  It  was  in  the  winter 
time  and  he  was  very  short  of  money.  He 
was  compelled,  like  the  vast  majority  of  work- 
ingmen,  to  buy  coal  by  the  basket,  and  thus 
pay  more  for  it  than  the  rich  man  does.  On 
New  Year's  Day  there  was  no  coal  in  the 
house,  and  it  was  bitterly  cold.  Fortunately, 
the  next  day,  when  it  was  8  degrees  below 
zero,  he  found  a  job  and  went  to  work  in  a 
shop  that  was  "open  to  the  air,  but  closed  to 
the  scab."  In  this  Union  shop  he  received 
[98] 


Trade-  Unionist. 

$2.25  a  day  for  nine  hours'  work,  good  money 
for  him  at  that  time,  but  he  could  not  get 
along  with  the  boss,  whom  he  described  as 
"an  intolerant,  brutal  bastard,"  and  left  to  go 
into  a  non-union  shop  at  $1.75  a  day  and  ten 
hours'  work. 

The  immediate  cause  of  his  rupture  with 
the  boss  of  the  Union  shop  was  a  dispute  about 
extra  wages.  He  had  worked  an  hour  and 
twenty  minutes  overtime,  but  was  paid  for 
only  an  hour.  Anton  kicked  for  more,  and 
the  boss  told  him  to  go  to  the  conventionally 
hot  place.  'Complain,  if  you  like,  to  your 
old  business  agent,'  he  said.  I  replied  that  I 
would  go  to  the  Police  Station  instead  and 
have  him  indicted  for  larceny  to  the  amount 
of  50  cents.  Then  he  got  mad  and  threw  a 
half  dollar  at  me,  and  said,  'Take  it  and  git 
out.'  I  sarcastically  asked  him  to  have  a 
drink.  While  I  worked  in  that  place  I 
thought  the  earth  was  not  so  big  a  Paradise 
as  some  philosophers  make  out.  Indeed,  soon 
after,  this  factory  burned  down." 

Very  unpopular  factories  sometimes  have 
this  habit  of  going  up  in  smoke. 

In  the  non-union  shop,  where  he  was  get- 
ting only  $1.75  for  long  hours,  Anton  did  not 
[99] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

feel  himself  much  better  off.  "It  was  a  rush 
place,"  he  said.  "Instead  of  running  15,000 
feet,  I  ran  50,000  feet  on  the  machine.  I  was 
too  strong  for  that  kind  of  a  job  and  quit  in 
two  weeks." 

His  brother  married  at  this  time,  oppor- 
tunely for  Ahton,  whom  he  invited  to  visit 
him  in  Clinton,  so  Anton  and  Maggie  and  the 
children  made  a  trip  home.  Maggie  staid  on 
for  several  weeks,  but  Anton  was  soon  back 
in  Chicago,  after  a  job,  which  he  found  at  the 
Union  Headquarters.  "The  official  head 
scrutinized  me,  as  he  always  did  new  men,  to 
see  if  I  was  a  victim  of  alcohol.  There  are 
many  mechanics  who  drink,  and  they,  of 
course,  are  often  laid  off.  The  firm  had  sent 
word  through  the  walking  delegate  that  they 
wanted  a  sticker  hand,  and  that  job  was  of- 
fered to  me.  The  man  whose  place  I  got 
was  a  drunkard.  He  had  not  showed  up  for 
several  days,  and  when  he  did  come  back  to 
the  shop,  he  asked  the  boss  to  lend  him  a  quar- 
ter to  get  a  drink.  He  was  an  excellent  me- 
chanic, but  that  was  too  strong,  and  he  was 
discharged." 

The  scale  at  this  Union  shop  was  $2  and 
eight  hours,  and  Anton,  feeling  well  off, 
[100] 


Trade-Unionist. 

wrote  Maggie  to  come  back.  He  arranged 
to  meet  her  at  the  train,  but  it  was  the  night 
when  the  district  council  met,  and  he  was  be- 
ginning to  be  deeply  interested  in  debates. 
He  gradually  learned  to  take  the  floor.  "At 
first  I  did  not  have  much  confidence  in  my- 
self. Since  then  I  have  accumulated  too 
much."  On  this  particular  night  he  was  to 
meet  a  business  agent,  a  radical,  courageous 
man,  whom  he  liked.  So  Maggie  and  the 
children  slipped  his  mind:  if  not,  he  thought 
they  could  take  care  of  themselves.  When 
he  returned  to  the  flat  at  ii  o'clock  he  found 
all  Maggie's  bundles  in  front  of  the  door. 
She  did  not  have  a  key,  and  had  to  go  with 
the  children  to  a  friend's  house  for  the  night  I 

"Anton,"  she  said,  "is  an  interesting  hus- 
band. He  is  very  fond  of  me  and  the  chil- 
dren, but  he  likes  to  talk  so  much  at  the  Union 
that  it  makes  him  sometimes  forget  every- 
thing else." 

It  was  perhaps  just  as  well,  for  Anton,  dur- 
ing Maggie's  absence,  had  quarreled  with  the 
landlord,  and  on  that  night  all  the  things  were 
packed  up,  ready  to  be  moved  the  next  day. 
"He  was  a  mean  bastard,"  said  Anton,  "and 
told  me  all  the  fault  was  with  the  Unions." 

[lOl] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

So  they  moved  to  a  little  flat  of  four  rooms 
over  a  grocery  store,  for  which  they  paid  six 
dollars  a  month. 

From  this  time,  which  was  in  1900,  An- 
ton's activity  in  the  Union  grew  rapidly. 
From  the  start,  he  assumed  a  critical  attitude. 
"I  was  always  suspicious,"  he  said,  "of  those 
who  had  more  authority  than  the  others.  I 
was  naturally  an  anarchist,  in  the  sense  that  I 
distrusted  all  authority,  though  I  did  not 
know  it,  at  that  time.  I  had,  however,  begun 
to  call  myself  a  Socialist.  I  was  too  emphatic 
about  it,  and  made  enemies." 

After  he  had  been  in  the  Union  about  six 
months,  he  was  approached  by  several  mem- 
bers and  ran  for  the  position  of  delegate  to  the 
district  council  of  the  woodworkers. 

"I  was  willing  to  be  a  delegate,"  he  said, 
"yet  I  felt  I  could  do  more  good  by  being 
closer  to  the  rank  and  file  and  remaining  free 
to  criticize.  I  had  a  suspicion,  like  a  good 
many  other  members,  that  the  district  council 
was  not  too  honest.  This  was  largely  a  mis- 
take, and  was  educated  into  me  as  it  was  into 
all  Socialists  by  the  Socialist  press  and  propa- 
ganda. At  that  time  all  Socialists'  papers 
bitterly  attacked  all  labor  leaders  and  called 
[102] 


Trade-Unionist. 

them  grafters  and  fakirs.  In  my  enthusiasm 
I  thought  the  Socialists  could  not  be  wrong; 
and  so  I  suspected  the  honesty  of  the  central 
organization.  But  I  thought  I  might  be  of 
service,  though  not  very  popular,  in  the  coun- 
cil, and  so  I  ran  for  the  position  and  was 
elected  by  an  overwhelming  plurality.  For 
weeks  I  had  attended  the  meetings  regularly. 
The  men  saw  in  me  a  peculiar,  rough  hon- 
esty, and  workingmen  like  that.  I  knew  men, 
and  felt  instinctively  that  it  was  best  to  ap- 
peal mainly  to  the  manhood  in  a  man.  Any 
injustice,  no  matter  how  small,  seemed  to  me 
of  the  greatest  importance  and  to  constitute 
a  big  question  for  consideration.  This  atti- 
tude, natural  to  me,  was  popular  with  the 
rank  and  file,  and  so  I  was  elected. 

"I  felt  very  important  for  some  time,  and 
thought  I  would  make  them  all  Socialists.  I 
understood  nothing  about  politics,  at  that 
time,  and  did  not  know  how  to  scheme.  I  al- 
ways acted  extemporaneously,  and  the  next 
meeting,  perhaps,  I  wanted  to  retract  what 
I  had  said  or  done.  I  did  not  go  to  the  cau- 
cuses, but  I  learned  from  experience.  I  was 
so  fierce  and  bold  and  frank  that  I  was  looked 
upon  as  a  danger  to  machine  rule.  I  was 
[103] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

under  no  obligations  except  to  the  rank  and 
file  who  elected  me. 

"After  I  had  been  a  delegate  for  some 
time,  I  discovered  that  a  large  majority  of  the 
delegates  were  as  honest  as  I,  but  I  also  saw 
that  they  were  more  or  less  helpless.  Some, 
indeed,  were  unscrupulous  at  times,  not  know- 
ing whether  to  advance  their  own  interests 
or  the  interests  of  the  majority. 

"There  were  two  prominent  walking  dele- 
gates who  represented  two  very  different 
kinds  of  men,  and  there  are  many  of  both 
kinds  in  the  Unions.  They  were  always 
fighting  each  other.  One  was  a  crafty  poli- 
tician without  any  convictions,  except  the 
need  of  holding  his  job  and  feathering  his 
nest;  and  the  other  was  a  man  who  believed 
in  the  rights  of  man,  who  loved  men,  and  who 
worked  for  them.  He  was  an  anarchist. 
This  man  had  been  chased  out  of  Germany, 
where  he  had  been  in  the  Reichstag,  and  in 
New  York  had  spent  a  year  in  Sing  Sing  be- 
cause of  a  speech  he  made  at  the  time  of  the 
hanging  of  the  Chicago  anarchists.  He  was 
a  vigorous,  positive  character,  and  never 
spoke  in  the  council  without  success.  He 
was,  and  is,  physically  and  mentally  strong. 
[104] 


Trade-Unionist. 

I  liked  him  for  his  hearty  way,  his  courage, 
and  his  love  for  men. 

"The  politician,  his  rival  in  the  council, 
was  a  thin  fellow  physically  and  mentally, 
though  very  clever.  He  was  also  a  positive 
character.  He  was  a  cunning  dodger  who 
sometimes  believed  in  resorting  to  the  jack- 
knife.  I  was  informed  by  the  anarchist  that 
this  politician  went  to  the  Bohemian  district 
and  made  a  speech  in  favor  of  a  certain  judge. 
I  was  disappointed  to  think  that  a  man  who 
claimed  to  be  a  Socialist,  and  was  active  in 
the  trades-union  movement,  would  support  a 
Democratic  judge.  As  I  was  in  doubt  as  to 
the  correctness  of  the  story,  I  went  to  him  di- 
rectly and  asked  him  point  blank  if  the  story 
was  true.  He  admitted  that  he  had  made  the 
speech,  and  wanted  to  know  who  told  me.  I 
finally  told  him  that  my  informant  was  the 
walking  delegate,  his  rival  in  the  council. 
Then  the  politician  told  me  how  it  came 
about.  The  judge  in  question  had  been  very 
lenient  in  cases  involving  strikers,  pickets,  vio- 
lence, etc.,  and  in  the  matter  of  fines,  and 
there  were  reasons  to  believe  that  he  would 
continue  this  favorable  attitude,  if  our  walk- 
ing delegate  would  speak  for  him  and  solicit 
[105] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

for  him  the  political  support  of  the  working- 
men.  So  the  judge's  friends  had  first  gone 
to  a  man  high  up  in  the  affairs  of  the  Inter- 
national, a  man  deeply  respected  and  admired 
by  all  parties.  He  had  refused  to  make  the 
speech — or,  in  fact,  to  make  a  speech  for  any 
judge.  This  thin  politician  was  then  ap- 
proached, and  he  consulted  the  respected 
leader  who  had  refused.  'Do  as  you  please,' 
was  the  reply.  'I  am  not  Anthony  Com- 
stock.'  He  then  consulted  his  rival,  the  an- 
archist, who  said:  'It  is  more  important  for 
you  to  use  your  own  judgment  than  to  do 
right.' 

"This  was  a  very  characteristic  reply  of 
this  anarchist  member  of  our  council.  Every 
woodworker  knows  this  man.  I  love  him. 
He  is  a  positive,  heroic  man,  who  does  not 
like  graft  and  theft,  but  who  knows  there  are 
worse  things.  And  that  the  kind  of  honesty 
that  is  harped  upon  by  the  reformers  is  often 
the  most  insidious  wrong  to  the  workingman. 
This  man  refuses  any  undue  luxury:  he  will 
not  drink  champagne  because  it  is  too  expen- 
sive and  unnecessary.  He  has  high  ideals, 
and  is  an  extensive  reader  along  his  line.  He 
never  went  to  an  English  school,  but  he  knows 
[io6] 


'Trade-Unionist. 

how  to  say  *I  give  a  damn'  in  the  most  ex- 
pressive and  independent  way.  He  can  go  to 
any  strange  town  and  arouse  an  ordinary 
meeting  with  more  lasting  enthusiasm  than 
any  man  of  my  acquaintance.  Once  I  heard 
him,  when  a  general  organizer,  .make  a 
speech  at  a  town  in  Wisconsin.  Previous  to 
his  speech,  he  had  read  the  town's  directory, 
picked  out  the  names  of  the  men  whom  he 
thought  could  be  reached,  and  wrote  them 
postal  cards.  The  character  of  each  man  he 
judged  largely  by  his  nationality — Swede, 
Pole,  Irish,  German,  etc.  He  represented  on 
the  postal  cards  that  the  meeting  was  social 
and  involved  no  responsibility  to  join  the 
Union,  and  no  fear  of  losing  their  jobs. 
Then  at  the  meeting  he  picked  out  the  men 
he  could  use.  He  had  been  attacked  in  one 
of  the  local  papers  as  an  anarchist,  and  in  a 
speech  to  the  meeting  he  said,  in  reply : 

"  'They  call  me  an  anarchist.  I  give  a 
damn  for  that.  I  admit  I  be  an  anarchist. 
The  only  question  is,  what  kind  of  an  anarch- 
ist. The  Mayor  of  St.  Paul — am  I  dat  kind 
of  an  anarchist?  Mr.  Rockefeller — dat  kind 
of  an  anarchist?  Mr.  Big  Business  Man, 
who  buys  the  law  to  help  his  business — dat 
[107] 


Trade-Unionist. 

kind  of  an  anarchist?  If  I  am  dat  kind  of 
an  anarchist,  dey  ought  to  chase  me  out  of 
town.  But  den  dey  can't,  for  den  I  have  too 
much  influence.  But  do  dey  mean  anodder 
kind  of  anarchist?  Do  dey  mean  by  anarch- 
ist a  pioneer  in  de  labor  movement?  Is  dat 
de  kind  dey  mean?  If  so,  den  I  am  an  an- 
archist, and  glad  of  it.'    _ 

"That's  the  man  who  replied  to  the  thin 
politician  that  it  was  more  important  for  him 
to  act  independently  than  to  ask  advice  about 
something  he  ought  to  know.  The  thin  man 
thought  that  his  rival,  when  he  told  me  about 
the  speech  supporting  the  judge,  ought  to 
have  given  me  the  reasons ;  and  he  wanted  me 
to  speak  against  his  rival  in  the  council.  But 
I  refused  to  do  so.  I  told  him,  however,  that 
if  the  opportunity  came  I  would  roast  him 
(the  thin  delegate),  and  that  would  give  him 
an  opportunity  to  explain  his  position.  He 
had  to  be  content  with  that.  I  got  this  op- 
portunity at  a  later  time,  as  we  shall  see." 

I  myself  have  met  this  labor  politician, 
whom  Anton  speaks  of  above.  And  the  dif- 
ference between  him  and  Anton  is  remark- 
able. It  does  not  lie  in  the  latter's  nature  to 
change  fundamentally.  No  matter  how 
[108] 


Trade-Umonist. 

"wise"  he  is  becoming  about  political  and 
other  methods,  he  remains  at  heart  a  work- 
ingman.  This  is  much  more  than  can  be  said 
of  many  of  the  other  leaders.  They  are,  as 
he  said,  roughly  divided  into  two  classes — 
the  enthusiast  and  the  politician. 

I  was  impressed  over  and  over  again,  when 
living  among  the  mechanics,  with  a  certain 
kind  of  altruism,  of  a  fairly  wide-spread  emo- 
tion of  solidarity,  akin  to  the  religious;  for 
when  men  band  together  in  an  effort  to  attain 
things  which  they  deem  necessary  to  their 
deepest  material  and  spiritual  welfare,  they 
are  not  far  from  conceiving  of  the  movement, 
at  least  in  moments  of  self-consciousness,  as 
being  from  one  point  of  view  religious.  The 
point,  indeed,  always  comes  in  the  affairs  of 
men  where  selfishness,  when  the  interests  in- 
volved are  of  the  deepest  moment,  becomes  to 
a  certain  extent  altruism.  If  we  strive  to  at- 
tain small  things  for  ourselves,  our  action 
seems  selfish ;  but  if  we  strive  for  the  highest 
good  to  ourselves,  our  deep  egotism  is  sympa- 
thetically called  altruism  and  assumes  an  emo- 
tional relationship  to  religion. 

The  best  men  in  the  rank  and  file  of  the  la- 
borers have  this  feeling  partly  unknown  to 
[109] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

themselves,  and  they  make  many  sacrifices  to 
it.  In  the  case  of  the  leaders,  however,  the 
situation  is  different,  in  large  measure,  and 
not  so  inspiring.  I  have  no  doubt  that  many 
of  them  are  honest  men — most  of  them  are 
honest  as  far  as  money  is  concerned — but  some 
of  them  still  seem  to  be  workingmen  at  heart, 
with  an  emotional  interest  in  their  class.  An- 
ton is  one  of  these,  and  so  is  his  friend,  the 
anarchist  agitator. 

Corruption  is  a  subtle  thing;  one  not  al- 
ways easily  recognized  by  the  uncasuistic 
man.  To  keep  clear  of  wrong  requires  intel- 
ligence of  a  high  order,  as  well  as  good  will. 
And  the  labor  leader  is  subjected  to  tempta- 
tions of  a  kind  not  easily  seen  as  temptations. 
By  virtue  of  these  he  often  becomes  far  less 
fundamentally  attractive  than  the  class  he 
represents. 

Several  sets  of  circumstances  bring  about 
this  degeneration,  for  it  is  degeneration,  of 
the  labor  leader.  As  he  acquires  the  feeling 
of  power,  he  tends  to  adopt  some  of  the  worst 
methods  of  politics,  and  encourages  the 
growth  of  a  public  feeling  often  extra-if  not 
anti-legal.  Several  men  in  Chicago  have 
said  to  me  things  which  indicated  an  apolo- 

[IIO] 


Trade-Unionist. 

getic,  or  even  exculpatory,  attitude  towards 
leaders  convicted  of  bribery  and  other  forms 
of  graft — a  kind  of  sentimentalism,  rather 
than  sentiment  for  the  cause.  They  often  ac- 
quire a  rather  unscrupulous  willingness  to 
adopt  the  unjust  methods  of  their  opponents. 
Demanding  fairness  and  charity,  they  are 
often  inclined  to  show  little  of  these  qualities. 
I  have  seldom  met  a  class  of  men  who  are,  in 
some  ways,  as  narrow-minded  and  as  preju- 
diced as  the  typical  labor  leader  of  the  "po- 
litical" type. 

But  this  is  not  the  worst.  Narrowness,  sus- 
piciousness, an  eager  tendency  to  accomplish 
good  results  unscrupulously,  if  necessary,  this 
is  natural  enough  to  men  of  little  preliminary 
training  and  not  often  of  the  best  natural 
quality — for  the  best  men  do  not,  as  a  rule, 
come  to  the  top.  And  the  essential  justice  of 
the  cause  outweighs  mere  money  dishonesty, 
if  the  spirit  be  otherwise  right. 

But,  worse  than  all  these  in  its  results,  is 
the  moral  change  due  to  a  different  standard 
of  life.  The  labor  leader  lives  well.  He 
spends  well.  He  drinks,  and  develops  the 
luxurious  needs  of  the  class  he  is  combating. 
"I  must  spend  50  cents  for  my  lunch,  at  the 
[III] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

very  least,"  said  an  admirable  carpenter  to 
me.  He  gets  in  a  habit  of  mind  where  he 
will  no  longer  work  at  his  trade,  even  if  he 
gives  up  a  position  which  ought  to  be  merely 
temporary.  He  becomes  a  "professional" 
leader.  Like  the  "professional"  politician, 
he  tends  to  become  inferior  morally.  He 
loses  sympathy  with  the  class  from  which  he 
has  sprung.  Living  no  longer  as  they  do,  he 
no  longer  genuinely  feels  their  needs.  On 
the  contrary,  he  is  likely  insensibly  to  attempt 
to  live  still  better,  insensibly  drifts  in  feeling 
into  the  class  supposedly  hostile  to  the  class 
he  officially  represents. 

He  loses  seriousness,  temperament.  I  have 
often  talked  with  men  in  the  rank  and  file  who 
fascinated  me  with  their  idealistic  earnest- 
ness, their  simplicity  and  pathetic  honesty; 
but  among  the  leaders  temperament  and  seri- 
ousness are  more  rare.  I  find  the  easy,  good- 
fellowship  characteristic  of  the  small  politi- 
cian, but  little  that  suggests  the  virtues  of  the 
laborer.  There  is  nothing  Millet-like  about 
many  of  them. 

The  importance  of  the  laborers'  representa- 
tives remaining  laborers  at  heart  is  obvious. 
Otherwise,  the  organizations  would  become  in 

[112] 


Trade-  Unionist. 

time  as  aloof  from  the  real  interests  of  the  la- 
borers as  the  bureaucracy  of  Russia  is  aloof 
from  the  interests  of  the  peasants. 

I  have  seen  on  many  occasions  a  crowd  of 
labor  leaders  standing  before  a  bar  and  spend- 
ing money  recklessly  for  drinks — many  dol- 
lars would  be  spent  by  each  man  in  the  course 
of  one  evening  in  this  way. 

They  have  the  false  ideals  of  drinking, 
"treating,"  of  doing  things  on  a  "big  scale," 
characteristic  of  the  rich  young  college 
buck  or  man-about-town.  This  is  hardly 
the  spirit  which  tends  to  preserve  what  is 
idealistic  and  humane  in  the  labor  move- 
ment. 

It  is  a  case  similar  to  what  has,  in  the  mat- 
ter of  the  Russian-Jewish  idealists,  frequently 
come  under  my  notice  in  New  York.  These 
people,  many  of  them,  came  to  America  with 
the  finest  ideals,  with  devotion  to  the  cause  of 
humanity,  with  a  love  for  Tolstoyan  doctrines, 
and  with  vividly  "temperamental"  expressive- 
ness and  earnestness.  Soon,  however,  when 
they  began  to  "get  up"  in  the  world,  they  lost 
their  interest  in  the  "movement,"  and  men 
who  had  been  simple  or  prophetic  workers 
for  a  cause  became  merely  practical  and  per- 
[113] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor, 

sonally   ambitious,   in   a  small   manner.     It 
seems  the  way  of  the  world. 

No  one  condemns  this  kind  of  labor  leader 
as  bitterly  as  do  the  real  workingmen, 
whether  they  belong  to  the  rank  and  file,  or 
whether  they  are  themselves  leaders,  but  lead- 
ers still  emotionally  devoted  to  the  "move- 
ment"— men  like  Anton  and  his  friend,  the 
anarchist  walking  delegate  and  organizer. 
They  do  not  condemn  the  "politician"  so 
much  because  of  any  "graft"  he  may  be  guilty 
of.  This  is  not  so  common  as  is  generally 
supposed,  although  being  spectacular  and  sen- 
sational it  is  what  usually  is  emphasized  in 
the  newspapers  and  in  novels  which  are  de- 
pendent on  the  exceptional,  the  bizarre,  on 
"high-lights"  for  their  effects.  They  rightly 
feel  that  occasional  theft  is  not  so  important 
as  the  emotional  backsliding  from  the  cause. 
They  realize  that  men  like  Parks  may  be  good 
men,  in  the  sense  that  they  keep  warmly  dis- 
posed to  the  interests  of  their  class;  and  the 
fact  that  such  a  man  might  be  inclined  to 
"steal"  from  the  class  whom  they  regard  as 
robbing  the  workingmen  in  general,  does  not 
seem  to  them  to  be  of  any  great  moral  mo- 
ment. 

[114] 


Trade-Unionis 

The  great  virtue  is  the  virtue  of  fidelity  to 
one's  constituents.  And  that  is,  indeed,  the 
origin  of  all  social  morality — to  live  up  to  the 
best  public  opinion  with  which  you  have  come 
in  contact — ^whether  that  public  opinion  be 
with  or  against  the  existing  law. 

One  night  I  met  in  Chicago  a  man  who 
well  illustrated  the  deepest  morality  of  a  cer- 
tain class.  He  was  a  criminal  and  an  outcast 
from  every  society  except  the  society  of  thugs 
and  vagabonds — no  man  in  any  class  would 
tolerate  him.  But  he  had  been  brought  up 
as  a  member  of  the  working  class,  and,  al- 
though he  had  lost  his  position  in  that  class, 
yet  he  had  retained  the  most  essential  of  its 
virtues,  its  feeling  of  organized  solidarity  and 
its  hatred  of  the  "scab." 

At  first  I  was  inclined  to  think  that  this 
Chicago  criminal  was  the  worst  human  being 
I  had  ever  known;  and  my  acquaintance 
among  people  officially  labeled  "criminal"  is 
considerable.  He  talked  about  his  deeds  in 
a  natural,  off-hand  way.  One  could  see  that 
the  opportunity  to  talk  pleased  him,  though 
it  was  against  his  sense  of  form  to  show  any 
undue  exhilaration  or  emotion. 

At  first,  he  seemed  a  little  doubtful,  a  little 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

hesitant,  not  having  made  up  his  mind 
whether  I  could  really  appreciate  him  or  not. 
But  when  he  had  hazarded  a  few  bolts,  and 
found  that  I  was  apparently  unmoved,  he 
launched  complacently  forth  in  a  description 
of  his  acts.  He  poured  them  out  imperson- 
ally, calmly,  yet  with  obvious  pride. 

He  had  originally  been  a  workingman ;  and 
even  now  he  takes  a  job  when  there  is  nothing 
more  lucrative  to  do.  And  he  still  has 
friends  among  the  honest  laborers,  who,  al- 
though they  do  not  approve  of  his  ways,  some- 
times use  him,  according  to  his  account,  to 
"smash"  a  scab  or  two.  He  has  been  very 
useful  to  some  of  the  violently  inclined  among 
the  labor  unions.  But  this,  although  there 
was  some  money  in  it,  was  after  all  a  labor 
of  love.  It  enabled  him  to  function  natu- 
rally, and  also  to  do  a  good  turn  to  society.  It 
seemed  a  small  thing,  even  to  me,  who  at  that 
time  was  unfamiliar  with  a  certain  set  of  eth- 
ics, in  comparison  with  some  of  his  other  ex- 
ploits. 

These  exploits  are  largely  unmentionable. 

His  mode  of  life  has  not  been  "nice"  at  all. 

He  has  not  only  "done"  people  openly  in 

broad  daylight  on  State  street  and  other  thor- 

[ii6] 


Trade-Unionist. 

oughfares,  but  he  has  been  effective  in  the  ex- 
pedition of  other  people,  men  and  girls,  to 
another  world.  His  treatment  of  the  women 
in  this  and  other  respects  has  been  abomina- 
ble. In  this  connection,  a  certain  method  of 
making  money  which  he  has  occasionally 
adopted  does  not  look  well,  even  when  merely 
thought  of. 

He  told  me  these  things  with  great  assur- 
ance, without  enthusiasm,  without  circumlo- 
cution. He  did  not  seem  to  feel  the  necessity 
of  delicacy  in  expression.  His  countenance 
is  open  and  frank,  and  his  blue  eyes  are  inno- 
cent and  he  talks  right  on. 

At  first  I  had  been  guarded  in  what  I  said 
to  him.  I  did  not  wish,  for  several  reasons, 
to  imply  any  disrespect.  I  knew  that  there 
was  such  a  thing  as  honor  among  thieves,  al- 
though personally  I  have  found  it  only  with 
the  help  of  a  microscope.  I  am  convinced 
that  it  represents  what  the  German  thinkers 
call  "a  vanishing  moment,"  only.  However, 
after  he  had  revealed  pretty  thoroughly  his 
ways,  I  felt  it  was  no  longer  necessary  to  be 
guarded.  Here,  apparently,  was  a  man 
whom  it  was  impossible  to  insult.  He  prob- 
ably had  no  sensibility. 

[117] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

So,  among  other  things,  I  asked  him  if  he 
had  ever  been  a  "scab"  or  had  worked  for  the 
corporations.  For  a  moment  he  looked  as  if 
he  would  strike  me.  But  all  he  did  was  to 
throw  up  his  hands,  and  say  in  a  deeply  hurt 
tone: 

"Oh,  no.  I  may  be  bad,  but  I'm  not  as  bad 
as  that.    That  is  against  my  principles." 

I  pacified  him  as  soon  as  possible.  I  said 
I  did  not  understand.  Even  yet,  I  had  not 
fully  realized  the  strength  of  the  social  law; 
"Thou  shalt  not  be  a  scab."  Public  opinion 
that  can  so  deeply  influence  the  code  of  a  man 
like  that  is  indeed  a  real  thing.  To  him  it 
was  the  first  and  only  commandment.  With- 
out that  he  would  have  been  utterly  lawless 
and  utterly  lost,  utterly  without  principle. 
His  morality  was  the  deepest  morality  of  his 
early  companions.  They,  of  course,  had 
other  virtues,  but  only  the  essential  virtue  re- 
mained with  him.  And  to  that  he  seemed 
true. 


[ii8] 


CHAPTER  VI. 

Meeting  the  Employer, 

A  STRIKE,  which  had  been  on,  over  the 
eight-hour  day,  for  several  months,  gave  An- 
ton the  opportunity  he  had  been  looking  for, 
to  bring  before  the  council  the  matter  of  the 
thin  politician's  speech.  At  that  time  the 
eight-hour  day  held  in  thirty-two  of  the  Chi- 
cago shops,  while  in  the  fourteen  unorgan- 
ized shops  the  working  time  was  nine  hours. 
The  employers  of  the  thirty-two  eight-hour 
shops  felt  they  were  competing  at  a  disad- 
vantage with  the  nine-hour  shops,  and  sent  a 
request  to  the  Union  to  appoint  a  conferring 
committee.  They  desired  the  men  to  send  a 
committee  of  six,  to  talk  the  matter  over  with 
the  employers'  committee  of  the  same  num- 
ber, and  see  if  they  could  not  arrive  at  a  set- 
tlement, and  stop  the  strike. 

The  men,  at  the  meeting  of  the  council, 
passed  a  resolution  to  appoint  a  committee  to 
meet  the  employers;  and  the  thin  politician 
[119] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

and  Anton  were  two  of  those  elected  to 
serve.  Anton  at  once  arose,  and  protested 
against  the  thin  politician  being  on  the  com- 
mittee. 

"He  is  unworthy,"  said  Anton,  in  his  speech 
before  the  council,  "of  serving  on  such  an  im- 
portant committee.  He,  at  one  time,  in  his 
official  capacity  as  walking  delegate,  made  a 
speech  in  favor  of  a  certain  judge  in  the 
Democratic  party." 

The  thin  politician  was  on  his  feet  imme- 
diately with  a  sweeping  denial,  and  a  demand 
for  the  name  of  Anton's  informant. 

"I  gave  the  name,"  said  Anton,  "and 
then  he  and  the  anarchist,  who  was  present, 
thrashed  the  matter  out.  There  is  more  to 
this  later  on,  but  for  the  time  the  thin  politi- 
cian was  sustained  as  a  member  of  the  com- 
mittee. I  had  satisfied  my  conscience,  how- 
ever, and  had  kept  my  promise." 

The  strike  of  the  woodworkers  had  begun 
several  months  before  the  conferring  commit- 
tees had  been  formed.  The  trade  agreement, 
entered  into  two  years  earlier,  provided  for  a 
nine-hour  day,  $2  minimum  scale  of  wages, 
absolute  closed  shop,  apprentice  system,  and 
the  inauguration  of  the  eight-hour  day  on 
[120] 


Meeting  the  Employer. 

February  ist,  1900.  All  the  factories,  with  a 
solitary  exception,  had  agreed.  The  men  de- 
manded a  ratification  of  this  agreement,  but 
the  bosses  insisted  on  going  back  to  the  nine- 
hour  day.  They  were  willing  to  pay  for  the 
extra  hour,  but  the  men  felt  it  was  important 
to  maintain  the  principle  of  the  eight-hour 
day.  The  employers  felt  themselves  stronger 
than  they  had  been,  for  at  that  time  there  was 
going  on  a  building  trades  lockout,  and  it 
looked  as  though  the  men  would  be  defeated, 
and  if  the  trades  were  defeated  it  would  be 
a  blow  to  the  woodworkers. 

Anton  worked  at  the  time  just  previous  to 
the  strike  in  the  sash  and  door  factory  of  C, 
E.  Petersen,  who  was  "a  monument  in  the 
Employers'  Association,"  and  he  was  also  ac- 
tive in  politics.  A  little  while  before  the 
strike,  Petersen  called  a  meeting  of  his  men 
and  made  them  an  address,  an  account  of 
which  is  thus  given  by  Anton : 

"He  told  how  much  the  trade  had  lost  as 
the  Unions  had  got  more  privileges,  but  he 
did  not  tell  how  he  had  been  able  to  build  his 
factory  larger  and  larger.  He  told  how  he 
had  charitably  built  homes  for  his  employees, 
but  he  did  not  dwell  on  the  rent  he  charged 
[121] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

them.  He  did  not  fail  to  tell  them  that  in 
case  of  a  strike  he  had  the  power  to  put  them 
out  of  their  homes,  but  that  he  was  too  good 
to  do  so.  At  the  close  of  his  lecture  he  said 
he  liked  his  men  and  would  love  to  pay  high 
wages  and  maintain  the  eight-hour  agreement 
and  keep  closed  shop,  but  that,  unfortunately, 
if  Bryan  was  elected  business  would  be  para- 
lyzed and  he  would  be  unable  to  keep  his 
agreement.  He  asked  the  men  to  give  an 
opinion.  They  all  sat  silent,  as  the  rank  and 
file  always  will,  so  I  spoke  up  and  informed 
him  that  all  of  his  men  had  voted  in  favor 
of  the  old  agreement,  which  provided  for  an 
eight-hour  day,  at  a  certain  date.  I  told  him 
that  all  of  the  men  were  satisfied  with  their 
employer  and  their  wages;  that  Bryan's  elec- 
tion was  almost  impossible,  and  that,  if  he 
were  elected,  it  would  make  no  material  dif- 
ference, that  the  political  parties  were  all 
alike. 

He  had  referred  in  his  speech  to  the  busi- 
ness agents  as  'the  hoodlums  downtown.'  I 
assured  him  the  men  had  not  listened  to  the 
'hoodlums,'  but  if  they  had  they  would  have 
accepted  the  nine-hour  day  instead  of  being 
against  it.     As  it  was,  they  had  taken  the  reins 

[122] 


Meeting  the  Employer. 

in  their  own  hands  and  voted  against  the  nine- 
hour  day. 

"Petersen  did  not  like  my  attitude.  He 
thought  I  was  a  Butinsky.  He  started  to  go 
away,  and  met  the  thin  politician,  who  had 
been  in  the  meeting  and  had  heard  himself 
referred  to  as  a  'hoodlum.'  But  Petersen  ex- 
tended his  hand  cordially,  and  so  did  the 
walking  delegate,  and  I  set  them  both  down 
as  hypocrites.  I  used  this  to  advantage  when 
the  strike  came  on  in  impressing  the  men." 

At  the  beginning  of  the  strike,  Anton  had 
been  made  captain  of  the  pickets.  "I  was 
fearless,"  he  said,  "and  I  also  had  enough  dis- 
cretion for  the  position.  My  duty  was  to  tell 
the  rank  and  file  of  pickets  what  to  do.  They 
were  to  watch  the  shop,  inform  all  scabs  that 
a  strike  was  on,  and  show  them  what  their 
obligations  to  the  community  were.  They 
must  persuade  these  men  by  peaceful  means, 
if  possible;  but  they  must  be  persuaded:  they 
must  see  the  light.  Often  the  only  way  to 
make  them  see  the  light  was  to  make  them 
fear  something  more  than  they  feared  going 
hungry." 

The  strike  in  Anton's  shop  lasted  only  a  few 
weeks:  the  men  lost,  and  when  Anton  ap- 
[123] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

peared  for  work,  he  was  politely  informed 
there  was  no  place  for  him ;  but  when  wanted 
he  would  receive  a  postal  card.  He  knew 
he  would  never  be  wanted. 

It  was  after  the  strike  in  the  shops  remain- 
ing out  had  lasted  several  months  that  the  em- 
ployers had  called  for  the  meeting  with  the 
men's  committee.  Petersen,  Anton's  employ- 
er, was  there,  and  a  Mr.  Von  Flatten,  who 
said  the  first  word  for  the  employers. 

"We  feel,"  he  began,  "that  as  the  strike  has 
lasted  so  long,  and  as  some  of  the  shops  have 
accepted  the  nine-hour  day,  our  shop  cannot 
grant  the  eight-hour  day;  if  we  did,  we  could 
not  compete  in  the  trade.  We  should  have 
to  close  our  mills  and  get  out  of  town." 

"I  got  up,"  said  Anton,  "and  made  for  Mr. 
Petersen.  I  remarked  that  I,  as  one  member 
of  the  committee,  felt  no  confidence  in  the 
committee  of  the  employers ;  that  I  questioned 
their  sincerity,  and  their  honesty.  At  this 
one  of  the  bosses,  a  good  man  named  Lock- 
wood,  grew  very  indignant,  and  said  his  hon- 
esty had  never  before  been  questioned.  I  was 
waiting  for  a  little  incident  like  that,  so  I 
apologized  and  said  that  perhaps  my  remark 
was  too  sweeping;  that  I,  as  a  matter  of  fact, 
[124] 


Meeting  the  Employer. 

referred  to  one  member  of  the  committee,  Mr. 
Petersen.     I  then  balled  him  out.     I  told  the 
committee  that  I  had  been  in  his  employ  be- 
fore the  strike;  that  he  had  had  a  meeting 
with  the  men  and  had  told  them  he  was  satis- 
fied with  the  attitude  of  the  organization,  and 
would  keep  his  agreement,  but  that  he  now 
wanted  to  break  it.     Mr.  McKinley  had  been 
elected,  and  Bryan  defeated,  and  now  there 
was  no  reason  why  Mr.  Petersen  should  not 
keep  the  old  agreement,  according  to  his  own 
statement.     While  I  was  speaking  Mr.  Peter- 
sen was  nervous  and  excited,  and  the  other 
bosses  were  tickled.     Petersen  said  I  had  mis- 
understood and  misconstrued  him.     I  said: 
'Mr.  Petersen,  it  is  too  late  now.     Your  men 
voted  for  Mr.  McKinley.     If  they  had  known 
how  you  would  act,  they  wouldn't  have  voted 
as  they  did.'    This  incident  gave  me  great 
satisfaction. 

"The  result  was  that  our  committee  made 
out  a  report  recommending  a  nine-hour  day. 
This  I  refused  to  sign,  as  I  had  been  so  in- 
structed by  my  local.  Yet  I  felt  the  position 
of  the  bosses  was  peculiar,  because  of  the  nine- 
hour  day  being  already  accepted  by  some  of 
the  shops.  When,  in  the  meeting  of  the 
[125] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

Union,  they  applauded  my  opposition  to  the 
nine-hour  day,  I  got  up  and  foolishly  said 
that,  while  I  voted  in  accordance  with  their 
instructions,  I  wanted  no  applause,  for  I 
thought  they  had  better  accept  the  inevitable 
and  consent  to  the  nine-hour  day.  There  was 
a  storm  of  disapproval  at  that.  It  was  far 
from  popular,  and  was  the  beginning  of  my 
internal  fights  in  our  Union." 

The  issue  was  left  to  a  general  referendum 
vote,  and  the  nine-hour  day  accepted  by  a 
small  majority;  and  so  the  strike  was  lost  to 
the  men.  The  nine  shops  which  had  been 
lost  went  back  to  ten  hours,  and,  as  always 
after  a  lost  strike,  the  membership  of  the 
Unions  dwindled  and  there  was  pretty  gen- 
eral discontent.  All  the  officers  who  had 
been  in  power  during  the  strike  were  defeated 
in  the  next  election,  except  the  thin  politician, 
partly  because  his  local  was  the  biggest  in  the 
city,  and  partly  because  he  had  trimmed  suc- 
cessfully during  the  fight. 

The  anarchist  organizer  had,  during  the 
strike,  been  outspoken  against  the  folly  of 
holding  out  at  this  time  for  an  eight-hour  day, 
when  the  conditions  of  organization  did  not 
warrant  it.  He  was  therefore  very  unpopu- 
[126] 


Meeting  the  Employer. 

lar.  After  the  men  had  returned  to  work,  a 
charge  was  trumped  up  against  him — that  he 
was  short  $24  in  paying  out  strike  funds.  He 
handled,  during  the  strike,  from  $2,000  to 
$5,000  every  week.  For  this  man  to  steal 
$24  seemed  to  any  one  who  knew  his  character 
an  utter  impossibility.  But  the  rank  and  file 
are  extremely  suspicious  of  their  leaders. 
Sometimes  they  have  good  reason  to  be,  but 
they  are  generally  unreasonable,  even  when 
right,  and  in  this  case  they  were  unreasonably 
wrong. 

A  trial  board  of  five  was  appointed  to  try 
this  burly,  honest  and  vigorous  man.  But  the 
board  did  not  have  the  courage  to  find  either 
for  or  against  him:  they  were  afraid  to  ac- 
quit him,  because  of  the  popular  prejudice, 
and  they  were  too  fair  to  find  him  guilty. 
So  they  recommended  that  the  council  should 
decide.  Anton  made  a  vigorous  fight  against 
the  cowardice  of  this  trial  board;  and  the 
council  re-committed  the  decision  back  to  the 
board,  which  again  showed  an  incapacity  to 
decide.  The  council  then  discharged  the 
board  and  elected  another.  When  the  an- 
archist was  summoned  before  this  second 
board,  he  did  not  appear,  knowing  that  the 
[127] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

proceedings  were  out  of  order.  He  made  as 
an  excuse  his  being  absent  from  the  city  on 
the  business  of  prosecuting  three  Union  men 
for  scabbing.  The  board  tried  him,  with  him 
and  his  witnesses  absent,  and  brought  in  a  ver- 
dict of  guilty.  Anton,  in  the  council  meet- 
ing, fought  vigorously  against  the  illegitimacy 
of  these  proceedings.  The  President  of  the 
council  left  his  chair  to  state  on  the  floor  his 
belief  in  the  insufficiency  of  the  evidence  on 
which  the  conviction  rested.  In  spite  of  that, 
this  President  voted,  when  it  came  to  the  roll- 
call,  in  favor  of  sustaining  the  decision  of  the 
board.  Only  four  or  five  members  of  the 
council  had  the  courage  to  go  in  the  face  of 
popular  feeling  and  vote  against  a  decision 
that  was  unjust  and  irregular.  The  power  of 
the  crowd  is  strong  enough  in  the  country's 
politics,  but  this  case  would  indicate  an  im- 
mediate reference  to  popular  passion  in  the 
affairs  of  the  Union  that  is  quite  as  strong  as 
anything  in  our  general  politics. 

The  defendant  appealed  from  the  Wood- 
workers' Council  to  the  General  Council, 
which  reversed  the  decision  and  ordered  a 
new  trial.  A  trial  board  of  three,  one  se- 
lected by  the  Woodworkers'  Council,  one  by 

[128] 


Meeting  the  Employer. 

the  General  Council,  and  the  third  elected 
by  the  two  appointed,  found  the  anarchist  or- 
ganizer innocent  of  the  charge,  and  he  \yas 
acquitted. 

Anton  has  a  great  deal  of  sympathy  for  the 
rank  and  file.  He  thinks  their  emotions  can 
be  trusted,  but  not  their  intelligence.  The 
unscrupulous  demagogue  or  the  hypocritical 
reformer  can  lead  them  with  ease,  if  he  is 
willing  to  observe  their  unreasoning  passions. 
Here  was  a  splendid  man,  who  had  for  years 
labored  in  their  interests,  and  yet  whom  they 
suspected  of  having  stolen  twenty-four  dol- 
lars! 

He  had,  indeed,  early  in  his  American  ca- 
reer, refused  to  have  anything  to  do  with 
trades-unionism:  he  was  a  fiery  Socialist,  and 
always  spoke  from  a  soap  box  or  in  the  shop. 
But  when  he  gave  up  Socialism,  because  of 
its  "intolerance,"  and  became  a  theoretical 
anarchist,  he  started  in  to  work  for  the 
Unions,  with  the  "general  strike"  as  his  slo- 
gan; and  knocked  fiercely  at  the  ballot  and  at 
the  efforts  of  the  Socialists  to  get  hold  of  the 
Unions  and  lead  them  into  politics.  He  made 
one  of  the  most  important  speeches  against 
the  Social  Democratic  party:  a  general  atti- 
[129] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

tude  that  has  now  become  the  slogan  of  the 
American  Federation  of  Labor,  where  the 
Socialists  are  very  unpopular. 

This  anarchist  was  a  splendid  organizer; 
he  organized  the  first  interior  finish  shop  in 
America,  and  being  in  New  York  when  the 
woodworkers  started  to  organize  in  Chicago, 
they  sent  to  New  York  for  him.  Three  years 
later,  the  same  Union  that  sent  for  him  wanted 
to  run  him  out  of  town,  because  they  thought 
this  devoted  man  had  misappropriated  $24! 
At  an  earlier  time  he  had  resigned  as  busi- 
ness agent,  because  of  the  hostility  of  the  Ger- 
mans, whose  clannishness  he  had  opposed. 
Immediately  after  his  resignation  the  Union 
lost  2,000  members  by  a  foolish  strike.  They 
went  out  when  they  were  not  strong  enough. 
It  was,  as  Anton  put  it,  "a  strike  of  enthu- 
siasm. They  struck  just  because  their  cause 
was  just — and  that's  no  reason  to  strike  at 
all." 

After  that  strike,  this  anarchist  organizer 
made  a  proposition  to  return  to  Chicago  and 
take  hold  and  help  the  Union  to  recover  its 
membership,  but  on  the  condition  that  he  be 
placed  in  a  position  of  absolute  autocracy. 
The  organization  would  not  accept  that.  "I 
[130] 


Meeting  the  Employer, 

also  opposed  it,"  said  Anton,  "though  I  ad- 
mired the  man  immensely." 

"I  admired  him  especially  because  he  was 
a  fire-brand,  and  yet  because  of  his  usefulness 
and  originality  was  tolerated  in  the  Federa- 
tion. He  never  takes  the  floor  till  he  is  ready 
to  fight.  I  have  heard  him  shout,  over  and 
over  again,  to  the  President:  'You  must  do 
this.  You  shall  do  this.'  He  is  an  autocrat 
by  nature,  but  he  hates  injustice  and  intoler- 
ance. He  bluffs  the  ordinary  workingman. 
The  crooked  man  is  afraid  of  him.  Yet  he 
does  not  expose  the  politicians  if  they  help  the 
work  of  organization.  That  is  the  main 
thing.  But  they  fear  him  because  they  know 
he  has  only  one  purpose.  It  may  seem  queer 
that  an  anarchist  should  be  so  much  of  an 
autocrat.  But  this  man  is  an  individualist, 
and  that  is  why  he  is  an  autocrat  and  an  an- 
archist. In  organizing  he  would  prefer  to 
pay  one  man  $ioo  a  week  than  ten  men  $io  a 
week,  if  the  one  man  was  active.  He  works 
for  the  mass,  but  he  does  not  believe  you  can 
work  with  the  mass.  I  have  not  met  a  strong 
man  in  the  trades-union  movement  who  would 
not  admit  anarchism  as  an  ideal — and  yet 
every  strong  man  is  an  autocrat. 
[131] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

"Sometimes  I  love  to  see  a  machine  or  a 
man  working  hard.  And  I  love  to  see  this 
man  talk.  When  he  is  speaking  he  sweats 
like  a  Polar  bear  in  mid-summer.  He  calls 
his  wife  'Mike.'  She  is  an  old  German 
woman  who  cannot  speak  English.  He  is 
very  kind  to  her,  gives  her  money  regularly, 
and  won't  look  at  another  woman.  Yet  she 
feels  she  is  a  martyr,  because  he  is  away  on 
the  road  so  much,  organizing.  He  consoles 
her  by  pointing  to  his  victories:  how,  after 
many  years'  struggle,  he  always  comes  out  on 
top.  He  thinks  this  ought  to  satisfy  her.  He 
will  never  forgive  you  if  you  step  on  his 
corns.  He  will  only  talk  about  trades-union- 
ism or  anarchism.  Maggie  likes  to  have  a 
man  talk  to  her,  or  at  least  look  at  her,  but  he 
won't.  You  can  generally  trust  a  man  like 
that.  No  man  on  earth  can  get  a  secret  from 
him.  His  great  object  is  the  movement.  He 
never  votes,  always  says  'damn  the  rank  and 
file,'  but  really  works  for  their  benefit." 

Anton  was  rapidly  losing  his  interest  in 
Socialism.  He  was  probably  influenced  a 
good  deal  by  the  general  spirit  in  the  Unions 
which  was  averse  to  making  the  movement  a 
political  one,  based  upon  a  distrust  of  politics 
[132] 


Meeting  the  Employer. 

in  general.  It  is  likely,  too,  that  the  striking 
and  picturesque  figure  of  this  anarchist  organ- 
izer made  a  deep  impression  on  him.  One 
of  his  deepest  passions  is  an  abstract  love  for 
toleration,  and  this  he  seemed  to  see  in  the- 
oretical anarchism.  His  growing  experience 
in  the  actual  affairs  of  organizations  had  made 
him  distrust  government,  and  at  the  same  time 
feel  the  necessity  of  it.  This  tended  to  give 
him  that  balanced,  psychological  attitude  that 
is  never  consistent,  but  usually  intelligent,  and 
which  he  associates  practically  with  philo- 
sophical anarchism.  He  saw  that  politics 
was  too  likely  to  determine  the  actions  of  the 
leaders  and  folly  that  of  the  rank  and  file. 

"At  this  time,"  he  said,  "I  was  still  a  So- 
cialist, but  a  rather  uncertain  one.  My  So- 
cialist friends  were  surprised  because  I  felt 
I  could  not  endorse  a  man  purely  and  simply 
because  he  was  a  Socialist.  He  must  have 
unionism  and  manhood  and  good-fellowship, 
too.  They  could  not  understand  my  motives 
for  doing  things.  They  thought  I  ought  to 
look  on  Socialism  as  something  holy.  They 
were  so  narrow  that  I  began  to  question  their 
philosophy.  I  began  to  be  sceptical  about 
Socialism,  just  as  I  had  been  sceptical  about 
[133] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

religion  and  politics.  I  saw  that  Socialism, 
too,  was  political,  and  liable  to  the  same  nar- 
rowness. I  championed  the  anarchist  organ- 
izer before  I  knew  him,  and  when  I  came  to 
meet  him,  his  ideas  took  a  strong  hold  on  me. 
My  attitude  for  justice  hurt  me  with  the 
Union,  for  a  time.  After  the  fight  in  the 
council  I  found  considerable  opposition.  I 
invited  great  disfavor  because  I  was  foolish 
enough  to  stand  for  only  what  I  knew  to  be 
right,  and  for  a  time  I  lost  ambition  in  that 
direction.  I  had  assumed  that  the  central  or- 
ganization was  capable  of  greater  things,  but 
their  treatment  of  this  sincere  man  sadly  dis- 
appointed me. 

"I  saw  that  politics  were  more  predominant 
than  reason.  I  saw  that  the  central  body  was 
controlled  by  politics  and  the  rank  and  file 
by  sentiment  and  emotion.  I  had  more  tol- 
erance for  the  sentiment  than  the  politics.  So 
I  stuck  to  the  man  and  went  to  every  meeting 
and  was  again  elected  as  a  delegate.  By  de- 
grees I  came  back  to  my  old  standing,  but  I 
came  back  a  sceptic,  not  trusting  anything,  but 
hoping  for  everything.  One  incident  that 
made  me  so  as  much  as  anything  was  a  deal  I 
learned  of,  proposed  by  the  thin  politician  to 
[134] 


Meeting  the  Employer, 

my  friend  the  anarchist.  I  will  not  say  what 
it  was,  but  it  was  a  proposal  not  altogether 
honorable.  The  anarchist  told  him  that  un- 
der no  circumstances  would  he  be  willing  to 
do  anything  of  that  kind;  that  while  he  was 
as  much  dissatisfied  with  the  damn  rank  and 
file  as  anybody,  yet  it  was  the  only  thing 
worth  working  for.  The  other  man  felt 
cheap  to  have  made  a  proposition  which  as- 
sumed that  the  anarchist  was  as  corrupt  as  he. 
I  got  wind  of  the  matter,  and,  as  on  a  former 
occasion,  I  went  to  the  thin  politician  and  told 
him  that  I  could  not  sit  as  delegate  in  a  coun- 
cil representing  the  rank  and  file  unless  every 
delegate  knew  this  story  about  the  chief  busi- 
ness agent,  in  whom  the  rank  and  file  put  its 
trust.  I  insisted  that  he  should  tell  the  coun-* 
cil,  and  he  promised  to  do  so,  but  many 
months  passed  and  he  did  not  do  it. 

"There  came  an  election  of  business  agents 
and  I  was  a  candidate.  I  was  defeated.  I 
stood  purely  and  simply  on  the  emotional 
side,  thinking  at  that  time  that  honesty  and 
good-will  were  all  that  were  necessary  to  be 
business  agent.  The  thin  politician  was  re- 
elected, and  I  waited  patiently  for  him  to 
make  the  statement  I  had  required  of  him. 
[135] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

But  he  did  not  do  so.  So,  when  the  board  of 
business  agents  reported  that  they  had  selected 
this  man  as  the  chief  business  agent,  I  got  up 
in  the  council  and  protested,  and  objected  to 
his  being  chief  business  agent  until  he  made 
a  statement  to  the  council  about  a  story  that 
had  been  circulated.  You  could  have  heard 
a  pin  drop  in  the  council  that  night. 

"He  got  up  and  told  the  facts,  partly  ad- 
mitting that  he  had  been  guilty  of  a  breach 
of  confidence  towards  the  organization;  but 
he  made  a  kind  of  threat  to  me.  He  said  I 
had  used  my  knowledge  of  the  affair  as  a 
knock  against  him  in  the  election,  and  that  if 
I  undertook  any  such  knock  again  he  would 
knock  me,  threatening  physical  force.  I 
wouldn't  stand  for  the  bluff ;  I  got  up  and  said 
that  I  had  been  absolutely  fair  with  him:  I 
had  gone  to  him  directly  with  the  story  and 
not  to  anyone  else.  If  he  had  heard  that  I 
was  'knocking'  him,  he  ought  to  have  come 
directly  to  me,  and  asked  if  it  was  true.  He 
then  grew  angry  and  said  if  I  did  not  keep 
my  mouth  shut  something  would  happen.  I 
then  informed  him  I  was  his  superior,  both 
mentally  and  physically.  There  was  no  man 
in  the  council,  I  said,  who  could  make  me 
[136] 


Meeting  the  Employer. 

keep  my  mouth  shut  by  reason  of  a  threat. 
I  branded  as  a  lie  the  charge  that  I  had  circu- 
lated stories  about  him,  and  challenged  him 
to  produce  a  single  witness  in  evidence  of  the 
truth  of  what  he  had  said." 

These  experiences  tended  to  disgust  Anton 
with  political  organizations,  and  the  Social- 
ists, of  whom  one  was  the  thin  politician, 
seemed  to  him  to  be  as  ready  for  deals  as  any 
one  else;  not  that  he  so  much  objected  to  a 
deal  practically,  it  was  rather  a  matter  of 
temper  and  mind  with  him.  He  wanted 
something  more  admirable  and  attractive,  less 
small  and  sordid.  He  saw  that  these  organi- 
zations of  workingmen  had  some  of  the  same 
drawbacks  that  obtain  in  the  larger  organiza- 
tion of  society  with  which  he  had  come  in 
disagreeable  contact  as  a  tramp. 


[137] 


CHAPTER  VII. 

The  Radicals. 

It  was  at  this  time  that  Anton  came  in  con- 
tact with  the  Chicago  Liberal  Society.  It 
was  composed  of  atheists,  free-thinkers,  "rad- 
icals" of  all  kinds.  The  word  "radical"  is  a 
common  one  in  Chicago.  In  it  a  great  deal 
of  what  is  most  significant  to-day  of  the  Mid- 
dle West  of  the  United  States,  and  of  what 
is  most  progressively  American,  is  embodied. 
It  is  a  vague  word,  implying  extreme  democ- 
racy, implying  also  an  attitude  of  criticism 
towards  many  of  the  institutions  founded  on 
a  capitalistic  order  of  society.  It  is  a  much 
more  "respectable"  word  in  the  Middle  West, 
or  at  any  rate  in  Chicago,  than  in  the  East. 
Not  only  in  labor  circles  and  in  out-and-out 
of  Socialistic  and  anarchistic  groups  does  one 
often  hear  this  word  used  with  approval,  but 
also  in  the  university  set,  in  the  social  settle- 
ments, even  in  business  and  professional  life. 
The  newspapers,  to  a  limited  extent  reflectors 
[138] 


The  Radicals. 

of  the  people's  temper,  show  in  a  hundred  im- 
plicit ways  the  degree  to  which  the  radical 
ideas  of  the  common  people  have  affected  all 
grades  of  society. 

Wherever  there  is  a  lack  of  cultured  train- 
ing combined  with  vitality  and  vigor  of  feel- 
ing and  thought,  there  are  likely  to  be  socie- 
ties half-baked  and  on  one  side  ridiculous  in 
character  —  pseudo-scientific,  spiritualistic, 
—  based  upon  a  strong  but  not  definitely 
worked  out  spiritual  life.  In  Chicago  there 
are  innumerable  clubs  and  societies  of  this 
kind.  Masonic  Temple  is  supposed  to  be  the 
seat  of  a  hundred  religious  or  emotional,  sci- 
entific or  social  faiths.  The  basis  for  all  these 
faiths  is  the  labor  situation.  Most  radicals 
are  either  working  people  or  else  persons  who 
have  come  in  contact  with  the  feelings  and 
ideas  evolved  by  the  laboring  class,  and  have 
come  to  express  them. 

The  Chicago  Liberal  Society  was  a  society 
of  this  kind.  Anton  was  thoroughly  in  a 
frame  of  mind  to  enjoy  a  gathering  of  this  sort 
— it  gave  an  opportunity  for  the  emotional 
needs  of  the  workingman  to  assume  an  intel- 
lectual and  scientific  shape,  no  matter  how 
crude  and  imperfect.  Ih  the  Unions  it  was 
[139] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

all  business  or  definite  struggle  of  one  per- 
sonality against  another;  it  was  good  to  escape 
from  these  inexpressive,  serious  gatherings 
and  go  to  hear  a  lecture  or  some  philosophical 
aspect  of  the  labor  or  social  situation.  An- 
ton, with  his  keen  senses,  his  keen  intelli- 
gence and  his  love  for  debate,  thoroughly  en- 
joys himself  in  these  gatherings.  In  them 
there  are,  of  course,  many  of  the  "long- 
haired, anaemic,  over-gentle  sort.  Into  these 
Anton  likes  to  stick  pins.  He  sympathizes 
with  many  of  their  ideas — he  feels  that 
through  them  he  and  his  class  are  being  ex- 
pressed, and  he  enjoys  thoroughly  the  more 
intelligent  ones  among  them,  but  he  sees 
their  limitations.  He  is  keen  in  the  detection 
of  shams,  and  when  he  finds  himself  dealing 
with  a  tender  imbecile  of  the  "radical"  variety 
he  is  like  a  bull  in  a  clover  fidd:  his  voice 
becomes  loud  and  his  words  are  rough.  Mag- 
gie cautions  him  not  to  break  loose — but  she 
wouldn't  love  him  so  much  if  he  didn't! 

One  of  the  first  of  Anton's  experiences  with 
the  Chicago  Liberal  Society  was  a  lecture  by 
Clarence  Darrow.  Anton  immediately  per- 
ceived that  here  was  a  man  voicing  many 
of  the  sentiments  and  "protests"  that  he  had 
[140] 


The  Radicals. 

vaguely  felt.     In  another  field  this  tended  to 
have  the  same  influence  on  his  critical  faculty 
as  the  reading  of  Tom  Paine's  Age  of  Reason. 
Darrow,  indeed,  is  a  man  wonderfully  typical 
of  one  aspect  of  the  life  of  the  Middle  West 
to-day — dreamer,  practical  man,  lawyer,  poli- 
tician,   friend   of   labor,    friend   of   women, 
friend  of  literature  and  of  experiment!     A 
rich  personality,  often  distrusted,  generally  in- 
consistent in  all  but  humanity,  too  complex 
to  be  philosophic,  but  a  gathering  point  for 
all  the  "radical"  notions  of  the  time.     Signifi- 
cant, indeed,  it  is  of  Chicago  and  of  the  Mid- 
dle West,  that  a  man  like  this  can  flourish  and 
occupy  a  position  of  respectability  and  prac- 
tical importance.     In  some  communities  he 
would  be  merely  laughed  at;  in  others  he 
would  be  forced  to  become  an  out-and-out  Bo- 
hemian.    But'in  Chicago  this  interesting  man 
is   pretty   nearly   appreciated   at   his   proper 
value;  for,  although  he  is  regarded  as  "dan- 
gerous"   by   the    ultra-conservative,    and    as 
"crooked"  by  the  pure  idealists,  and  as  "im- 
moral" by  the  inexperienced  ladies  of  blue 
stocking  tendency,  he  occupies,  nevertheless, 
a  position  of  suflicient  respectability  to  enable 
him  to  work  and  live  to  the  best  advantage. 
[141] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor, 

Interested  as  Anton  was  in  these  gatherings, 
it  did  not  prevent  him  from  exercising  his  crit- 
ical faculty.  A  little  before  the  lecture  which 
meant  so  much  to  him,  a  member  of  the  local 
Union  of  which  Anton  was  the  President, 
died,  leaving  a  widow  and  six  children  in  ab- 
solute destitution.  While  he  was  ill,  he  re- 
ceived $4  a  week  benefit  for  thirteen  weeks 
before  his  death.  His  widow  received  $75 
for  his  burial.  This  was  barely  enough  for 
that  purpose.  She  asked  Anton  to  assist  her 
in  raffling  of¥  her  husband's  tools.  In  the 
Union  meeting  he,  as  chairman,  called  for  a 
voluntary  committee  for  this  work.  The  re- 
sult was  $87.75  for  tools  worth  about  ten  dol- 
lars. Then  Anton  went  to  the  shop  where 
the  deceased  had  worked,  to  try  to  get  some 
money  from  the  employer.  He  himself  had 
worked  there  soon  after  his  arrival  in  Chicago 
and  had  been  discharged,  so  it  was  with  some 
pride  that  he  introduced  himself  as  the  Presi- 
dent of  Union  67.  The  employer  recognized 
him  and  was  at  first  inclined  not  to  give  him  an 
audience. 

"But  I  knew  he  was  a  Jew,"  said  Anton, 
"and  I  immediately  branched  into  philosophy 
and  put  in  my  opposition  to  Christianity.  So 
[142] 


The  Radicals. 

he  wrote  me  out  a  check  for  $25  for  the 
widow.  I  went  to  her  with  this  money  and 
also  the  raffle  money;  found  her  in  three  lit- 
tle miserable  rooms  in  Halsted  street.  The 
six  children  were  lying  and  walking  all  over 
the  floor,  and  the  baby  was  in  a  chair  along- 
side the  tub  where  the  mother  was  washing. 
She  cried  when  I  gave  her  the  money. 

"While  I  had  been  engaged  in  selling  the 
tickets,  I  appeared  at  the  Masonic  Temple 
one  night  where  a  lot  of  the  bug-house  cranks 
and  free-thinkers  had  got  together  to  expose 
their  irreligious  matters  in  a  religious  way. 
[Anton  himself  often  talks  in  a  way  that 
makes  him  subject  to  his  own  satire.]  It  was 
the  Chicago  Liberal  Society,  now  dead,  and 
was  composed  of  men  and  women  of  Lofty 
Ideals.  I  felt  sure  that  these  people  would 
assist  me  in  such  a  worthy  cause.  The  Church 
would  not,  though  the  widow  had  been  a  mem- 
ber for  years.  She  had  neglected  to  send  the 
children  to  Sunday  School  regularly,  for  the 
Sunday  School  does  not  want  children  who 
have  not  good  clothes.  So  poverty  kept  the 
children  home  and  when  the  father  died,  the 
Church  would  do  nothing. 

"The  Free-thinkers,  however,  I  thought 
[143] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

would  do  something.  I  had  been  a  member 
of  the  Society  for  some  time,  had  taken  part  in 
the  discussions  and  was  known.  I  spoke  to 
the  President  and  the  trustees  and  asked  them 
to  let  me  have  the  floor  to  explain  the  circum- 
stances and  ask  the  audience  to  contribute. 
That  was  a  more  effective  way  than  to  ask 
each  one  separately  and  would  save  time. 
The  President  ran  a  book  store,  and  that  was 
really  the  reason  why  he  was  a  member  of 
the  Liberal  Society.  He  wanted  them  to  buy 
his  books  liberally.  That  was  the  only  lib- 
eral thing  about  him.  So  he  told  me  that  he 
would  like  to  accommodate  me,  but  there  were 
other  things  more  important.  They  would 
not  let  me  have  the  floor  and  I  was  horribly 
disappointed.  My  spirit  of  protest  became 
aroused  again,  and  I  wondered  if  there  was 
anything  right  anywhere.  I  went  around 
among  the  members  and  sold  about  twenty 
tickets.  I  waited  for  an  opportunity  to  make 
an  expose  of  their  hypocrisy.  They  made  a 
display  of  being  opposed  to  the  Church  be- 
cause it  enslaved  humanity,  but  when  it  came 
for  them  to  show  any  superior  feeling,  they 
failed  to  make  good." 
Anton  perceived  another  instance  of  human 
[144] 


The  Radicals. 

weakness  and  self-interest  in  this  matter  of  the 
tools.  An  affectionate  Irishman  won  the  raf- 
fle. He  was  a  common  laborer,  not  a  member 
of  the  Union.  Finding  that  most  of  the  im- 
portant tools  were  missing,  he  thought  he  had 
been  "done"  and  went  indignantly  to  Anton, 
and  scolded  him:  said  he  had  thought  better 
of  the  Unions  than  that.  Anton  went  to  the 
woman,  who  cried,  and  said  that  a  member  of 
the  Union  Committee  had  picked  out  the  best 
tools  and  intended  to  keep  them.  They  were 
fortunately  still  in  the  house,  and  Anton,  after 
telling  the  woman  not  to  let  the  tools  be  taken 
away,  went  to  the  man  who  had  tried  to  steal 
them.  This  man  was  always  suspicious  of  the 
honesty  of  the  Union  officials. 

"I  balled  him  out,"  said  Anton,  "and  told 
him  I  would  prefer  charges  against  him  in 
the  Union,  if  he  took  the  tools.  Then  I  went 
to  the  Irishman  from  whom  I  wished  to  hide 
the  guilt  of  our  member,  in  order  not  to  dis- 
turb the  man's  sympathetic  inclinations  to- 
ward Unions.  I  told  him  a  mistake  had  been 
made  and  he  would  find  the  tools  at  the  wom- 
an's house.  He  was  tickled  to  death.  I  did 
not  expose  our  member  in  the  Union  meet- 
ing on  account  of  his  wife  and  children.  He 
[145] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

was  an  awful  ugly  fellow,  a  brutal  shaker- 
hand.  He  was  so  meek  morally  that  he  im- 
agined he  was  strong  and  tried  to  roast  every- 
body else  on  the  score  of  dishonesty." 

The  lecture  of  Mr.  Darrow's  which  made 
so  great  an  impression  upon  Anton  was  on 
"Crimes  and  Criminals"  and  seemed  to  the 
workingman  to  be  much  nearer  the  truth  than 
the  current  ideas  on  the  subject.  After  his 
lecture,  Mr.  Darrow  announced  the  coming 
of  Prince  Kropotkin,  who  was  to  lecture  be- 
fore the  Society;  he  was  to  speak  on  Modern 
anarchism.  ^ 

"I  was  still  a  Socialist,"  said  Anton,  "but  a 
wavering  one.  I  had  a  strong  appetite  to 
understand  anarchism,  and  I  was  eager  to  hear 
this  lecture.  But  yet  I  could  not  resist  the 
opportunity  to  protest.  Mr.  Darrow  re- 
quested that  a  certain  woman  present  should 
sell  tickets  for  the  event,  and  the  chairman  put 
the  request  before  the  Society.  I  arose  and 
forced  recognition  from  the  chair  and  said : 

"Mr.  Chairman,  while  I  have  no  objec- 
tion to  granting  the  request  of  Mr.  Darrow 
for  a  purpose  of  this  kind,  yet  I  feel  inclined 
to  protest  against  this  manner  of  granting  spe- 
cial privileges.  When  I  requested  the  priv- 
[146] 


The  Radicals. 

ilege,  a  few  weeks  ago,  of  saying  a  few  words 
to  the  Society,  to  induce  them  to  help  a  poor 
woman,  the  floor  was  denied  me.  I  feel  cer- 
tain that  my  mission  was  far  more  urgent  and 
necessary  than  the  intellectual  luxury  of  hear- 
ing Mr.  Kropotkin;  although  it  would  not 
have  brought  as  much  honor  to  the  Society. 
I  stand  here  and  say  that  I  think  our  President 
is  as  much  a  hypocrite  now  as  ever.' 

"Then  came  the  gavel,  but  I  continued,  and 
said :  *  I'll  be  glad  to  hear  Kropotkin,  and, 
although  I  desire  to  expose  the  hypocrisy  of 
the  President  of  the  Liberal  Society,  I  am  still 
capable  of  being  unselfish  enough  to  hope  that 
he  will  remain  President  as  long  as  he  is  en- 
gaged in  the  book  business.' 

"He  blushed.  I  was  so  unruly  and  crude 
and  unrefined  that  it  put  him  in  a  difficult  and 
peculiar  position.  After  the  meeting  I  went 
to  the  secretary  and  told  him  to  take  my  name 
off  the  list  of  membership.  I  told  him  I  was 
opposed  to  the  Church  because  of  its  hypoc- 
risy; and  that  if  I  belonged  to  a  Society  that 
had  a  hypocrite  for  its  President,  I  too 
would  be  a  hypocrite.  A  man  is  a  man,  after 
all,  whether  he  is  the  President  of  the  United 
States  or  only  the  President  of  the  Liberal  So- 
[147] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

ciety.  They  are  very  much  alike.  The  So- 
ciety is  dead  now;  it  broke  up  because  of  being 
split  into  factions  and  everybody  seeking 
places  of  honor,  money  and  graft.  The  So- 
ciety was  like  the  Unions,  the  Churches,  and 
everything  else.     It  is  the  same  old  story." 

Anton,  however,  was  very  anxious  to  hear 
Kropotkin,  and  to  have  the  workingmen  hear 
him,  so,  one  evening  coming  from  work,  he 
went  to  Mr.  Darrow's  office  and  asked  him 
for  tickets.  Mr.  Darrow  was  interested,  gave 
him  twenty  tickets  and  asked  him  to  try  to  get 
the  workingmen  to  go  to  the  lecture.  ''Sell 
them  if  you  can,"  he  said;  "if  not,  give  them 
away.  No  need  to  make  an  account."  An- 
ton succeeded  in  interesting  several  Union 
men,  and  when  the  night  of  the  address  came, 
the  laboring  world  was  well  represented.  An- 
ton's account  of  the  lecture  is  as  follows : 

"Mr.  Darrow  introduced  Kropotkin  with 
the  remark:  'In  Russia  they  exile  their 
prophets.  In  this  country  we  hang  them. 
[This  was  in  reference  to  the  execution  of  the 
Chicago  anarchists.]  He  then  gave  an  ac- 
count of  Kropotkin's  life,  said  he  had  been  of- 
fered the  world  if  he  would  suppress  his  in- 
clination to  champion  the  masses  against  the 
[148] 


The  Radicals. 

classes.  He  was  of  the  aristocracy  of  Russia 
and  could  have  been  prominent  in  the  govern- 
ment, but  he  preferred  to  cast  all  this  aside. 

"Then  the  old  gentleman  spoke,  to  a  packed 
house,  in  every  chair  there  being  a  copy  of 
Free  Society.  I  vs^as  terribly  interested,  for 
he  dwelt  on  something  new  and  very  sympa- 
thetic. He  told  of  the  waste  of  energy  there 
is  in  labor,  more  wasted  than  profitable  labor. 
He  emphasized  strongly  the  great  waste  of 
labor  in  making  the  implements  of  war,  which 
is  government  murder.  He  spoke  of  the  prin- 
ciples of  anarchism  and  socialism  and 
sketched  the  history  of  the  struggles  of  the 
working  classes  in  Europe.  He  stated  that 
the  American  workingman  ought  to  be  thank- 
ful for  the  opportunities  here  in  land  and  tim- 
ber and  natural  resources ;  that  the  soil  seemed 
to  contain  all  that  was  necessary  for  life,  vigor 
and  happiness.  He  thought  that  if  the  work- 
ingmen  in  America  were  as  energetic  in  ef- 
forts for  freedom  as  they  were  in  Europe, 
they  ought  here  to  be  more  successful.  If  the 
American  workingmen  failed,  they  them- 
selves would  be  largely  responsible  for  it,  he 
said.  He  made  a  strong  point  against  the 
British  government  because  of  the  war  with 
[149] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

the  Boers.  Here  the  applause  was  great,  and 
Mrs.  Potter  Palmer  and  other  conservative 
people  who  were  there  clapped  their  hands. 
But  right  after  the  applause,  he  made  a  similar 
remark  about  Uncle  Sam's  treatment  of  the 
Philippines.  The  audience  continued  to  ap- 
plaud, but  with  not  so  much  vigor.  He  then 
said  it  was  very  easy  for  Americans  to  criti- 
cize the  government  of  Russia ;  but  when  you 
attack  the  government  in  the  land  in  which 
you  live,  you  are  then  regarded  as  an  anarch- 
ist. This  speech  made  a  deep  impression 
upon  me,  and  I  became  far  more  interested  in 
anarchism. 

''I  took  home  with  me  a  copy  of  Free  So- 
ciety. I  was  interested  in  it,  and  decided  to 
investigate.  Kropotkin's  lecture  had  been  so 
great  a  contrast  to  what  I  had  heard  of  an- 
archism. I  thought  anarchists  were  all  red- 
handed  devils.  I  had  the  common  concep- 
tion. I  saw  advertized  in  Free  Society  Jean 
Grave's  Moribund  Society  and  Anarchy  and 
I  went  to  the  editor  of  Free  Society,  Mr; 
Isaak,  and  bought  copies  of  this  book  to  dis- 
tribute among  my  friends.  I  went  by  the 
house  several  times  before  I  got  courage  to  go 
in.  I  thought  there  might  be  bombs  in  the 
[150] 


The  Radicals. 

house.  Finally  I  went  in  and  met  Isaak's  son, 
who  is  hard  of  hearing.  I  imagined  he  might 
only  be  pretending  deafness,  and  that  he  was 
dangerous.  He  invited  me  to  go  up-stairs  to 
see  his  father,  but  I  was  suspicious,  and 
thought  it  was  a  trap.  So  I  bought  twelve 
copies  and  went  away.  I  found  out  after- 
wards that  they  were  much  interested  that  a 
workingman  should  come  voluntarily. 

"I  took  these  twelve  copies  of  Grave's  book 
to  the  Union  meeting  and  distributed  them. 
They  began  to  call  me  an  anarchist.  I  was 
rather  proud  of  it.  At  that  time  I  was 
President  of  my  local  and  had  to  sign  a 
document  favoring  the  building  of  battleships 
by  Union  men.  This  act  was  repulsive  to 
me  even  then,  even  from  a  Socialist  stand- 
point. 

"A  member  of  the  Machinists'  Union,  an 
anarchist,  asked  me  why  I  signed  it,  if  I  didn't 
want  to.  I  couldn't  tell  him.  I  couldn't  ex- 
plain my  position  to  him,  any  more  than  I 
can  explain  life.  I  was  President  of  the 
Union  and  it  was  important  to  extend  Union 
principles  everywhere.  Life  is  so  made  that 
nothing  can  be  consistent  it  seems. 

"Yet  if  we  never  try  to  be  consistent,  we  are 
[iSi] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

certainly  no  better  than   grafters;   not   that 
grafters  are  necessarily  very  bad." 

Anton  now  began  to  attend  the  meetings  of 
the  Philosophical  Society.     At  first  he  was  al- 
most afraid  to  say  "good  evening"  to  them, 
as  he  thought  they  represented  an  astonishing 
amount  of  learning  and  intelligence.     But,  as 
he  gradually  took  part  in  the  debates,  he  found 
it  a  good  school.     It  helped  him  in  the  Union 
meetings,  to  make  his  points.     In  these  phil- 
osophical meetings,  he  felt  he  was  learning 
something;  while  in  the  meetings  of  his  Union 
the  main  considerations  were  practical   and 
warlike — measures  by  one  class  against  anoth- 
er.    Maggie  always  insisted  that  Anton  went 
to  the  Unions  to  have  a  good  time.     This  is 
only  partly  true;  I  have  often  seen  him  in 
a  position  where  he  gave  up  the  opportunity 
of  going  to  the  Masonic  Temple  and  exciting 
himself  temperamentally  and  intellectually  in 
debate,  for  the  calmer,  more  business-like  and 
generally   quite   unexciting   Union   meeting, 
which  he  regarded  as  his  duty. 

A  few  months  after  Kropotkin's  talk,  An- 
ton  became  what  he   calls   "an   anarchist." 
With  him,  this  faith  is  an  attitude  of  mind, 
the  expression  of  general  class  unrest,  rather 
[152] 


The  Radicals. 

than  definite  affiliation  with  a  group  or  any 
definite  philosophical  tenets.  In  this  respect, 
Anton  is  typical  of  a  great  many  of  the  more 
intelligent  and  active  laboring  men.  The  ex- 
tent to  which  emotional  anarchism  obtains 
among  the  mechanics  is  very  great.  Many 
men  who  occupy  a  conservative  and  impor- 
tant position  in  the  Unions  are  at  heart  what 
they  call  anarchists.  One  of  the  high  officers 
of  the  American  Federation  of  Labor  took  oc- 
casion, during  the  meetings  of  an  International 
Labor  Congress,  which  took  place  some  time 
after  the  period  of  this  narrative,  to  reprove 
Anton  because  of  the  boldness  with  which  he 
gave  expression  to  anarchistic  principles  on 
the  floor  of  the  meeting.  "We  are  all  anarch- 
ists," he  said,  "but  what's  the  use  of  shouting 
about  it?" 

A  few  nights  following  the  death  of  Presi- 
dent McKinley,  Anton  was  attending  a  meet- 
ing of  the  Union.  After  the  meeting,  Anton 
and  several  other  officers  went,  as  usual,  to  a 
saloon.  They  talked  about  the  assassination, 
Anton,  an  enthusiastic  Socialist,  and  a  sceptic- 
al Scotchman  who  never  committed  himself. 
While  they  were  talking  and  drinking,  a  stran- 
ger who  seemed  to  be  under  the  influence  of 
[153] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

liquor  came  up  to  them  and  asked  a  pointed 
question  as  to  what  they  felt  about  the  assassi- 
nation. The  Socialist,  who  was  a  Swede, 
said;  "Well,  I  don't  know.  I  sorry  he  dead, 
but  I  sorry  he  capitalist."  The  stranger  then 
asked  the  Scotchman,  who  replied:  "My 
God,  I  was  just  going  to  ask  you.  What  do 
you  think?"  Then  the  stranger  put  the  ques- 
tion to  Anton,  who  "was  rather  sceptical  as  to 
the  justification  of  his  butting  in."  But  he 
replied:  "I  would  have  as  much  and  per- 
haps more  sympathy  for  my  neighbor  if  he 
were  killed  than  for  McKinley.  I  should 
feel  sorry  for  his  wife  and  children." 

This  reply  did  not  suit  the  stranger,  and  he 
cried  out  that  Anton  was  an  anarchist.  There 
was  great  confusion  in  the  saloon  and  it 
looked  like  a  fight,  until  the  Scotchman  gave 
the  stranger  the  signal  of  the  Masonic  Order, 
and  then  it  was  all  right. 

Anton  had  become  sufficiently  known  as  an 
anarchist  to  make  Maggie  nervous  about 
what  might  happen  to  him,  in  the  excitement 
following  McKinley's  assassination.  So  she 
burnt  up  the  copies  of  Free  Society,  Jean 
Grave's  book  and  some  Socialistic  papers; 
fearful  that  her  husband  might  be  arrested, 
[154] 


The  Radicals. 

Anton  "was  disappointed,"  as  he  expressed 
it,  at  this,  for  at  that  time,  in  the  first  flush  of 
his  anarchistic  faith,  he  would  have  welcomed 
arrest.  At  a  later  time — now — he  is  much 
cooler  about  all  theories.  Now  that  he  is 
more  of  an  anarchist,  in  the  sense  of  being 
more  of  a  sceptic,  he  is  far  less  of  a  propa- 
gandist. He  is  now  as  sceptical  about  an- 
archism as  he  is  about  any  other  system  of 
running  the  world's  affairs  successfully. 

Even  at  that  time  he  felt  the  logical  diffi- 
culties of  his  faith;  for  with  him  it  was  a 
faith,  just  as  his  early  religion  had  been.  "I 
had  difficulties,"  he  said,  "in  calling  myself 
an  anarchist  and  yet  not  being  able  to  justify 
my  position  theoretically.  I  saw  that  system 
and  force  were  necessary:  that  we  had  to  em- 
ploy both  these  things  in  the  Union,  and  yet 
it  did  not  affect  my  feeling.  Anarchism  cap- 
tured my  fancy  for  it  seemed  the  strongest 
protest  against  economic  and  social  injustice. 
It  seemed  more  humane  and  sympathetic  than 
anything  else." 

Vague  as  his  anarchism  was,  it  seemed  to 
get  him  into  trouble;  first  with  his  family; 
then  with  the  law,  indirectly. 

"I  was  lacking  in  tact,"  he  explained,  "  told 
[155] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

my  position  to  a  young  man  from  Clinton 
who  was  visiting  in  Chicago.  When  he  went 
back  to  Clinton  he  told  everybody  I  was  an 
anarchist.  My  brother  wrote  me  I  would 
soon  be  a  victim  of  the  hangman's  noose,  and 
he  appealed  pathetically  to  me  to  change  my 
ways.  He  had  no  effect  on  me,  whatever,  for 
I  felt  I  was  far  above  him  in  every  way. 
Mother,  too,  wrote  me.  She  seemed  to  think 
that  I  would  be  in  the  pen  and  that  this  was 
the  logical  result  of  a  hobo's  career.  I  was 
very  sorry  that  mother  thought  I  was  an  an- 
archist, according  to  her  conception  of  the 
word.  As  for  my  brother  I  wrote  him  and 
showed  him  where  he  got  off  at.  I  gave  him 
several  quotations  from  the  Bible  and  told 
him  that  if  he  carried  these  out  he  would  be 
an  anarchist,  too.  They  felt  sorry  for  Mag- 
gie, had  it  all  fixed  that  I  would  die  a  dog's 
death,  but  it  has  as  yet  failed  to  materialize. 

"At  this  time,  I  was  always  out  with  my 
neighbors.  I  was  always  discussing  union- 
ism, socialism  and  anarchism.  I  used  to  bore 
people  terribly  and  they  didn't  like  me.  I  was 
brutally  frank,  and  the  police,  at  this  time, 
as  before  and  since,  were  disagreeable  to  me. 
One  afternoon  I  saw  a  large  crowd  at  59th 
[156] 


The  Radicals. 

Street  and  Center  Avenue  and  I  discovered 
three  policemen  roughly  arresting  two  young 
fellows.  One  of  them  was  intoxicated  and 
used  rough  language,  but  this  did  not  seem 
to  me  sufficient  cause  for  arrest.  I  said 
sarcastically,  *  It  seems  to  require  three  po- 
licemen to  arrest  two  kids.'  One  of  the  po- 
licemen, who  was  drunk,  grabbed  me  and 
said:  'Come  along  and  I'll  teach  you  a  lesson.' 
So  they  put  me  in  a  patrol  wagon  and  would- 
n't let  me  notify  the  wife,  and  took  me  to  the 
police  station.  The  crowd  held  an  indigna- 
tion meeting  but  it  came  to  nothing  through 
lack  of  organization.  I  noticed,  when  in  the 
police  station,  that  one  of  the  young  fellows, 
who  was  the  son  of  a  State  Senator,  received 
a  great  deal  of  consideration.  He  was  not 
booked,  but  was  sent  home.  I  was  booked  for 
disorderly  conduct,  and  I  and  the  other  fel- 
low were  put  in  jail. 

"I  finally  got  telephonic  connection  with  a 
Union  saloon-keeper  and  asked  him  to  get 
me  out.  In  the  meantime,  my  wife  was  won- 
dering what  had  become  of  me.  About  ii 
o'clock  at  night  a  policeman  rapped  with  his 
club  at  her  door  and  hollered:  'I'm  a  police- 
man come  to  tell  you  your  husband  is  in  jail 
[157] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

and  wants  you  to  come  and  get  him  out.' 
This  was  typical  of  the  delicacy  of  the  or- 
dinary cop.  It  was  a  shock  to  her,  as  she 
thought  I  had  been  arrested  as  an  ordinary 
anarchist.  She  went  to  the  saloon-keeper  and 
then  they  came  to  the  jail  and  bailed  me  out. 

"I  got  busy,  and  found  the  man  I  had  made 
the  remark  to.  He  promised  to  appear  as  a 
witness  in  the  trial  on  Monday.  But  the  po- 
liceman was  busy,  too.  He  laid  the  law  down 
to  this  Swede,  my  witness,  and  told  him  not 
to  come  down  to  testify.  Before  the  trial 
came  up  on  Monday  I  met  the  young  fellow 
who  had  been  arrested  with  me.  He  had  a 
card  addressed  to  a  detective  in  that  precinct. 
The  card  came  from  a  rich  coal-dealer  and 

said:     'This  young  man,   Mr.  ^   is   all 

right.'  The  detective  told  him  what  to  do, 
to  plead  guilty  and  look  sorry.  I,  however, 
would  not  plead  guilty.  I  was  too  indig- 
nant. When  the  case  was  called  the  police- 
man made  a  mild  charge  against  the  young 
fellow,  and  he  was  discharged.  When  I 
came  up  they  handed  me  a  jury- waiver.  I 
started  to  read  it  aloud.  That  was  awful. 
The  young  fellow  and  the  detective  pulled  my 
coat,  to  no  avail.  I  wouldn't  keep  quiet.  I 
[158] 


The  Radicals. 

signed  it,  when  I  had  read  it.  Then  the  po- 
liceman made  his  charge,  stated  he  had  told 
me  to  go  home  three  times,  and  had  then  ar- 
rested me.  I  pleaded  not  guilty.  The  prose- 
cuting attorney  asked  me  if  I  meant  to  in- 
sinuate that  the  officer  of  the  law  was  telling 
a  falsehood.  I  said,  no,  that  was  not  my  in- 
tention, but  I  had  noticed,  I  said,  that  on  that 
night  the  officer  of  the  law  was  not  sober,  and 
his  memory  therefore  might  not  be  entirely 
accurate.  What  I  said  was  received  with 
scorn,  but  the  Judge  said,  as  I  didn't  look 
like  a  tough,  he  would  only  fine  me  $5  and 
costs.  I  asked  him  if  I  was  fined  because  I 
wasn't  tough.  He  said  if  I  didn't  keep  still 
he  would  fine  me  $25.  They  took  me  away 
and  put  me  in  the  Bull  Pen.  I  was  indig- 
nant and  the  spirit  of  protest  arose  in  me.  I 
got  to  the  telephone,  and  reached  the  Union 
Headquarters.  The  business  agent  came  and 
paid  the  fine. 

"I  went  to  the  saloon-keeper  who  had 
bailed  me  out,  and  told  him  the  story.  He 
was  indignant  and  said  he  would  fix  the  po- 
liceman, who  was  under  obligations  to  him. 
When  I  applied  for  work,  I  was  discharged 
for  not  appearing  on  Monday.  I  had  lost  my 
[159] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

job,  had  paid  a  fine,  and  Maggie  was  dis- 
couraged, all  because  I  had  said  a  sarcastic 
thing  to  a  policeman.  Suppose  some  capital- 
ist had  said  the  same  thing  to  a  cop.  Do  you 
think  the  cop  would  have  arrested  him?  Not 
on  your  life!  But  a  workingman  is  different. 
Maggie  roasted  me  for  fair;  said  I  could 
never  hold  a  job  because  I  was  too  blunt  and 
aggressive.  She  also  said  some  hot  things 
about  the  copper. 

"The  next  time  the  policeman  went  to  the 
saloon,  my  friend  raised  Cain  with  him; 
told  him  I  was  the  President  of  the  Union 
and  a  thoroughly  honest  working  man.  The 
policeman  said  I  was  to  blame  for  insulting 
the  integrity  of  the  Court  by  making  a  de- 
fense. But  he  was  sorry,  for  the  saloon- 
keeper had  influence,  and  that  night  I  met  the 
policeman  in  the  saloon.  He  said  he  was 
very  sorry  and  would  get  me  my  job  back. 
He  took  me  to  my  old  employer  and  told  him 
a  lie  and  the  employer  said  we  would  have  to 
see  the  foreman  who  had  discharged  me. 
The  foreman  '  had  it  in '  for  me.  He  had 
formerly  been  a  member  of  the  Union  and 
was  a  great  grumbler.  When  he  got  the  po- 
sition as  foreman  he  withdrew  from  the  Un- 
[i6o] 


The  Radicals. 

ion.  When  he  asked  to  have  his  resignation 
accepted,  I  had  roasted  the  living  life  out  of 
him.  I  said  I  was  sorry  that  a  man  of  such 
independence  of  character,  such  an  unsuc- 
cessful grumbler,  should  take  the  position  of 
foreman  and  therefore  lose  an  opportunity  of 
using  his  w^onderful  talents  against  the  em- 
ployers ;  he  couldn't  grumble  any  more  with- 
out losing  his  job:  what  a  hardship  I 

"So  when  I  came  to  work  under  him  he 
took  the  first  opportunity  to  discharge  me. 
But  now,  thinking  the  employer,  the  police- 
man and  the  saloon-keeper  (three  great  pow- 
ers) were  for  me,  he  re-instated  me  in  my 
position.  Then  I  went  to  the  foreman  and 
called  him  every  name  in  my  vocabulary,  and 
quit.  I  needed  a  job,  but  the  spirit  of  re- 
venge was  strong  in  me  and  at  that  time  I  was 
all  revolt.  I  knew  Maggie  would  roast  me, 
but  I  could  not  help  it.  ^ 

"The  policeman  was  now  very  friendly  and 
said  he  would  try  to  get  my  money  back.  He 
called  on  Maggie  and  apologized.  But  the 
wife  gave  him  her  opinion  of  him,  and  pic- 
tured to  him  the  hardship  he  had  caused. 
He  had  a  wife  and  three  children  and  he 
started  to  cry  like  a  child.  While  the  wife 
[i6i] 


The  Spirit  of  I  jab  or. 

was  satisfied  with  that,  I  was  not,  and  started 
to  propagate  some  of  my  ideas  on  him.  So  I 
asked  him  if  a  police  officer  ought  to  make 
any  distinction  between  one  man  and  another, 
except  the  criminal  and  the  law-abiding 
classes.  I  asked  him  if  he  didn't  think  that 
I  and  other  law-abiding  citizens  were  unsafe 
on  the  streets  as  long  as  there  were  two  or 
three  policemen  who  did  not  know  them. 
He  admitted  that  if  he  had  known  me,  he 
wouldn't  have  done  it.  He  grasped  at  my 
meaning  for  he  said :  '  The  socialists  are  all 
right,  but  there  are  not  enough  of  them.'  He 
arranged  to  meet  me  the  next  night  at  the  sa- 
loon and  take  me  to  where  I  could  get  my 
money  back.  We  met  there  a  Swedish  sa- 
loon-keeper, political  boss  of  the  Swedes  in 
that  neighborhood,  who  immediately  took  ad- 
vantage of  the  situation  in  order  to  get  my 
political  support. 

"Why  didn't  you  tell  me  about  Anton,' 
he  said  to  the  policeman.  'I  have  known 
about  him  for  years,  though  I  have  not  had 
the  pleasure  of  meeting  him.'  I  had  been 
his  invisible  friend,  so  to  speak.  The  police- 
man, at  the  Swede's  suggestion,  took  me  to 
the  house  of  a  man  who  was  the  boss  of  the 
[162] 


The  Radicals. 

County   Central   Committee.    When   I   met 
him  I  recognized  him  as  a  former  President 
of  the  Building  Trades  Council  during  the 
lockout  of  1900.     He  was  a  delegate  to  the 
Chicago  Federation  of  Labor  and  knew  me — 
knew  me  not  so  much  as  a  woodworker  as 
in  my  character  of  Socialist  and  a  man  who 
knew  something  of  the  inside  working  of  the 
political  machine.     He  was  afraid  of  me,  and 
said  if  the  fine  had  not  been  recorded,  the  ac- 
tion could  be  rescinded  by  the  same  Judge. 
He  was  very  guarded  and  made  arrangements 
to  meet  me  at  the  saloon.  There  he  treated  me, 
but  said  he  could  do  nothing.     He  sprung  25 
tickets  on  me  for  the  Carter  Harrison  Mas- 
querade Ball,  at  50  cents  apiece.     The  Union 
I  belonged  to  was  largely  composed  of  Scan- 
dinavians,  and   this   Swede   boss   thought   I 
might  be  of  use,  so  he  gave  me  the  tickets. 
He  said  he  thought  Unions  could  do  more 
good  if  they  were  in  politics.     I  was  to  get 
a  job  as  garbage  box  inspector  at  $4  a  day, 
if  I  worked  for  the  cause.     I  took  the  tickets 
to  the  next  meeting  of  the  Union.     I  told  the 
story  before  a  crowded  meeting,  told  them  the 
politician's  game,  and  tore  up  the  twenty-five 
tickets,  that  went  around  the  ward  for  four 
[163] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

or  five  months.  The  policeman  thought  I 
was  unwise,  but  whenever  he  met  me,  he  in- 
sisted on  shaking  hands,  and  on  buying  me 
a  drink." 

*'That  winter  I  became  a  candidate  for 
business  agent.  I  was  all  emotion  and  enthu- 
siasm. I  had  a  certain  amount  of  courage 
and  a  little  scattering  of  information.  I  still 
thought  all  that  was  needed  was  to  be  honest 
and  sincere.  If  I  had  known  more  about  the 
movement  I  would  have  known  I  had  as  much 
chance  to  be  elected  as  the  Lord  himself." 

All  these  events  strengthened  Anton  in  his 
emotional  anarchism,  but  also  tended  to  make 
him  see  that,  when  it  came  to  action,  it  was 
necessary  to  make  use  of  the  machinery  there 
was  at  hand.  But  even  then,  when  he  was 
President  of  the  Union,  had  a  wife  and  three 
children  and  had  had  much  experience  with 
men,  he  still  permitted  himself  the  luxury  of 
losing  his  job  in  order  to  satisfy  his  tempera- 
ment. It  was  about  this  time  that  he  ac- 
cepted the  offer  of  a  job  in  Oak  Park,  rented 
a  house  in  the  neighborhood,  and  when  he 
went  to  work,  was  told  another  man  had  been 
hired  in  his  place. 

''I  was  taken  aback  and  nonplussed  at 
[164] 


The  Radicals. 

first,  but  recovered  myself,  took  my  overcoat 
off,  and  told  the  employer  I  thought  he  was  a 

and  I  could  lick  him.     He  said  he 

would  give  me  $5  extra  for  my  inconvenience. 

I  told  him  to  go  to ,  packed  my  tools,  and 

asked  him  how  he  would  like  to  be  in  my  po- 
sition.    I  said  if  I  didn't  have  more  sympa- 
thy for  my  wife  and  children  than  he  had  for 
the  men,   I  would  blow  his  brains  out.     I 
called  his  attention  to  the  fact  that  he  went 
to  Church  every  Sunday,  was  opposed  to  ly- 
ing and  yet  would  place  a  man  in  a  posi- 
tion where  he  was  forced  to  lie  or  go  hungry. 
When  I  should  apply  for  work  in  another  fac- 
tory the  first  question  asked  me  would  be, 
'Where  did  you  work  last?'     If  I  should  act 
according  to  the  Sunday  School  I  would  have 
to  tell  the  truth.    The  next  question  would 
be,   Why  did  you   leave?'     I,   being  influ- 
enced by  your  religion,  would  have  to  say, 
'fired  for  incompetency.'    While  most  of  you 
employers  like  a  truthful  man,  nearly  all  of 
you  would  let  him  go  hungry  under  these  cir- 
cumstances.'    I  made  an  impression  on  his 
daughter,  who  was  in  the  room.     She  was  a 
pretty  girl  and  when  she  looked  at  me  she 
blushed. 

[165] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

"He  finally  gave  me  a  letter  of  reference, 
which  I  used  against  him.  I  asked  him,  in 
front  of  the  girl,  if  that  was  his  signature. 
He  said  yes.  I  said,  'that  signature  means  the 
calling  of  a  strike  in  your  own  shop.  I  will 
present  it  to  the  Woodworkers'  Council  and 
demand  a  strike,  as  you  have  discharged  me  in 
favor  of  a  non-Union  man,  without  other 
cause,  as  this  letter  proves.'  He  flushed  and 
charged  me  with  ingratitude.  He  had  the 
nerve  to  do  that,  but  I  went  to  the  next  meet- 
ing of  the  Union,  told  my  story  and  requested 
them  to  instruct  their  delegates  to  the  Coun- 
cil to  authorize  the  walking  delegate  to  de- 
mand from  the  employer  a  re-imbursement  or 
re-instatement,  and  I  put  my  bill  at  $25.  It 
was  carried,  and  taken  to  the  Council,  which 
voted  unanimously  in  favor  of  it.  The  next 
Monday  I  and  the  business  agent  went  to  Oak 
Park,  and  interviewed  the  employer.  The 
business  agent  pointed  out  that  the  agreement 
provided  for  no  discharge  without  cause,  and 
that  the  employer's  letter  showed  there  was  no 
cause.  The  employer  refused  to  re-imburse 
me,  and  then  the  business  agent  said  he  would 
call  the  strike.  Whereupon  the  employer 
shelled  out  the  money  and  I  accepted  it." 
[166] 


CHAPTER  VIII. 

Organizer. 

This  temperamental  play  on  Anton's  part 
meant  no  work  for  several  weeks,  and  often 
nothing  in  the  house  to  eat.     But  he  was  a 
strong,  young  fellow,  and  his  wife  a  strong, 
young  woman,  and  very  competent,  and  the 
children  were  as  robust  and  strong  as  young 
oaks,  and  they  all  liked  to  buck  the  world. 
And  the  feeling  of  solidarity  is  so  great  in 
the  Trades-union  World,  that  they  knew  they 
had  the  sympathy  and  if  need  be  the  material 
aid  of  thousands  behind  them.     Then,  both 
Anton  and   Maggie  liked  so  much  to  talk 
and   talk  to  one   another,   that  every  event, 
untoward  or  favorable,  gave  them  food  for 
expressed    thought.     They    are    remarkably 
frank  and  honest  to  one  another — think  aloud. 
"I  could  not  live  with  Maggie,"  said  Anton, 
"if  in   the  long  run   I   could   not  tell  her 
everything  that  ever  happened  to  me."     And 
Maggie,  for  her  part,  said,  "I  could  not  live 
[167] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

with  Anton  if  he  were  like  the  men  they  call 
good  husbands,  if  he  always  staid  home  at 
night,  and  did  not  need  to  work  and  live 
and  have  pleasure  among  many  men  and 
women;  when  he  is  home,  there  is  always 
something  interesting  to  talk  about.  He  is 
so  full  of  life,  always  something  doing.  It  is 
good  to  live  with  him." 

So  the  idle  time  passed  without  too  much 
hardship,  and  Anton's  next  job  was  an  inter- 
esting one.  One  day  he  saw  an  advertise- 
ment for  a  "sticker-hand"  in  West  Chicago, 
which  was  at  that  time  "a  hot-bed  for 
scabs." 

There  was  not  a  Union  shop  in  the  town. 
Maggie  at  first  objected.  She  saw  that  in 
this  "scab"  town  Anton  would  agitate  and 
probably  get  into  trouble.  So,  previous  to 
taking  the  job,  he  had  a  talk  with  the  foreman. 
He  explained  that  he  was  a  Union  man,  and 
that  while  he  was  willing  to  do  his  duty  dur- 
ing work  hours,  he  insisted,  after  the  whistle 
blew,  on  talking  to  his  fellow  men,  in  the  way 
he  thought  was  right.  The  foreman  ap- 
proved of  Anton's  position.  He  was  in  favor 
of  Unions  himself,  though  he  did  not  dare  to 
tell  the  men  so.  He  liked  Anton,  and  offered 
[i68] 


Organizer, 

him  $3  a  day,  the  largest  wages  he  had  yet  re- 
ceived. 

So  he  moved  his  family  to  West  Chicago, 
and  began  his  first  important  work  as  an  or- 
ganizer, in  a  town  that  knew  no  union  prin- 
ciples and  had  no  Union  shop,  in  any  trade. 

"An  organizer,"  said  Anton,  "must  under- 
stand human  nature ;  and  particularly  the  lim- 
itations of  human  nature.  He  must  be  an 
expert  in  the  art  of  getting  men  together  with- 
out their  suspecting  why.  He  must  over- 
come the  Idea  of  'I-will-if-you-will.'  He 
must  be  a  good  speaker,  a  good  fellow  and 
have  unlimited  patience.  He  must  speak 
clearly  and  to  the  point  and  inoffensively." 

During  work  and  after  work  and  in  the 
evening,  Anton  talked  Unionism  to  the  men 
in  this  non-Union  shop.  He  had  not  been 
there  two  months  before  he  began  to  make  an 
impression. 

"I  made  such  good  headway,"  he  said, 
"that  I  received  the  earnest  opposition  of  the 
German  Lutheran  preacher.  One  of  the  firm 
in  my  shop  was  a  director  in  the  Church  and 
a  large  contributor.  When  he  and  the 
preacher  saw  what  my  views  were  and  that  I 
was  agitating  for  the  Union,  they  quietly  told 
[169] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

such  of  the  men  as  were  Church  members  to 
be  shy  of  me." 

Anton's  first  convert  was  the  young  fellow 
who  worked  as  his  helper.  He  had  been  in 
that  shop  seven  years  and  then  was  not  a  me- 
chanic. The  man  who  had  had  Anton's  place 
had  taught  this  young  fellow  as  little  as  pos- 
sible; and  the  boy  felt  it.  Anton,  however, 
showed  him  every  thing  about  the  trade  he 
could ;  but  while  he  taught  him  the  business, 
he  also  taught  him  Unionism  and  Socialism. 
"I  could  not  go  as  far  as  anarchism  with  a 
young  fellow  like  that,"  he  said. 

The  German  Lutheran  preacher,  however, 
had  fewer  scruples  than  Anton,  for,  perceiv- 
ing that  this  young  man  was  being  influenced 
by  the  agitator,  he  gave  the  young  fellow  a 
book  "The  Greatest  Enemy  of  God  Is  The 
Labor  Movement."  This  book  was  written 
right  after  the  Haymarket  Riots,  and  was  only 
one  of  a  number  of  books  and  pamphlets 
which  represented  the  Labor  Movement  as 
the  Arch-enemy  of  Mankind.  The  boy  im- 
mediately took  the  book  to  Anton,  who  read 
it  and  "showed  the  kid  the  inconsistencies  and 
the  abundant  fallacies  it  contained,  and  gave 
him  other  antidotes." 

[170] 


Organizer. 

In  the  meantime,  Anton  had  been  working 
systematically  with  the  other  men  in  the  shop. 
"I  got  them  all  to  agree  with  me,  individually. 
Then  I  got  up  a  discussion  at  the  noon-hour 
and  no  one  opposed  my  arguments ;  for  if  they 
had,  I  could  have  exposed  them,  as  they  had 
agreed  with  me  individually.  After  about 
three  months,  I  called  a  meeting  at  my  house, 
but  did  not  tell  them  why  I  wanted  them. 
Nine  of  them  came  that  night.  I  opened  a 
case  of  beer  and  told  them  my  mission. 
'There  is  no  use  hiding  the  thing  any  longer. 
There  is  nothing  to  be  ashamed  of.  I  have 
talked  to  every  one  of  you  and  you  all  agree 
in  the  necessity  of  a  Union.  All  sign  your 
names  and  give  me  a  dollar.' 

"They  were  speechless,  but  after  talking  it 
over  for  an  hour,  and  Maggie  bearing  her 
share  in  the  talk  nobly,  one  of  them  finally 
signed,  and  then  the  others  did.  I  immedi- 
ately sent  to  Chicago  for  a  charter;  so  that 
the  Minister  would  have  no  show.  I  made 
all  arrangements  for  a  meeting  on  Sunday, 
and  in  the  meantime  got  the  signatures  of  the 
other  nine  men  in  the  shop — there  were  eight- 
een in  all.  I  went  to  the  Mayor  and  asked 
him  to  let  us  have  the  City  Hall  for  a  meet- 
[171] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

ing.  I  jollied  up  the  Justice  of  the  Peace  who 
wanted  money  and  needed  to  make  friends 
with  everybody.  He  helped  me  with  the 
Mayor,  but  his  Honor  said  the  council  would 
have  to  act  on  it.  I  went  to  the  Postmaster, 
who  was  a  politician,  who  promised  to  get 
us  Oddfellows'  Hall,  and  we  made  arrange- 
ments for  Monday  night. 

"When  I  went  to  the  shop  Monday  morn- 
ing I  found  the  Preacher  had  been  at  work. 
He  had  called  a  meeting  of  the  Church 
directors  and  trustees  for  that  night.  Three 
of  my  men  were  trustees  in  the  Church  and 
in  this  way  he  intended  to  prevent  them  at- 
tending our  meeting.  They  came  to  me,  and 
I  told  them  we  would  put  off  our  meeting 
till  Tuesday  night;  I  encouraged  them  and 
told  them  the  Preacher  would  not  oppose  us 
after  we  were  successful;  that  is  the  way  of 
the  Church.  We  had  our  meeting  and  I  was 
elected  President  and  a  skunk  named  Jones 
Secretary.  Dues  were  placed  at  50  cents  a 
month. 

"This  was  the  first  Union  ever  formed  in 
this  town,  and  the  news  spread  like  wild-fire. 
The  Secretary  wanted  the  back-room  of  a  sa- 
loon for  our  regular  meeting  place,  but  I  was 
[172] 


Organizer. 

opposed  to  this ;  it  was  not  dignified  enough. 
So  we  hired  a  nice  place  at  $2  a  meeting. 
Tom  Kidd,  a  big  man  in  our  International 
Union,  wrote  and  congratulated  me  on  form- 
ing the  Union,  and  asked  me  what  my  ex- 
penses for  organizing  were.  I  was  tickled  to 
death  to  get  this  endorsement,  and  wrote  him 
that  my  bill  was  nothing,  but  if  he  were  so  dis- 
posed, he  could  send  us  two  Union-made  gav- 
els, of  black  ebony,  one  of  which  I  wanted  to 
give  to  the  Oddfellows  for  lending  us  their 
hall  and  one  to  the  Brotherhood  of  railroad 
trainmen,  whose  good-will  we  desired.  The 
railroad  men  were  indifferent,  but  the 
Oddfellows  let  me  make  a  speech  of  presen- 
tation, in  which  I  explained  the  purposes  of 
Unionism." 

The  effects  of  organization  were  almost  im- 
mediate. It  was  a  ten-hour  day  shop,  but  as 
there  were  no  lights,  it  had  been  the  custom 
to  work  only  nine  hours  in  the  winter  time. 
A  few  days  after  the  Union  was  formed  the 
employers  announced  a  uniform  nine-hour 
day.  The  men  had  made  no  demands,  but 
they  already  occupied  a  position  of  greater 
prestige.  Anton's  next  step  was  to  get  the 
men  to  appoint  an  agreement  committee. 
[173] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

His  difficuties  in  teaching  the  men  to  act  for 
themselves  are  thus  described  by  him : 

"In  the  meeting  I  expected  some  one  to 
make  the  motion  to  appoint  the  agreement 
committee.  We  had  talked  it  all  over  before- 
hand. Not  a  single  man  took  the  floor  or 
moved  in  that  direction.  I  did  not  feel  quite 
justified  in  stating  the  thing  from  the  chair, 
and  when  no  further  business  came  up,  I  ad- 
journed the  meeting.  Immediately  every- 
body wanted  to  know  why  the  committee  had 
not  been  appointed.  I  replied  that  no  one 
had  made  the  motion.  One  was  afraid  of  the 
other  and  wanted  me  to  bear  the  burden  of 
responsibility  in  case  of  the  bosses'  discrimi- 
nation against  them.  1  told  them  they  would 
have  to  call  a  special  meeting,  as  otherwise 
it  would  be  too  late  to  lay  our  demands  be- 
fore the  employers  at  the  time  we  had  ex- 
pected. This  they  did,  in  the  same  hall,  on 
the  same  night.  When  this  meeting  was  re- 
convened I  pointed  out  the  difficulties  in  the 
way  of  wage  workers  bettering  their  condi- 
tions, and  showed  them  that  their  own  actions 
had  demonstrated  that  they  were  not  as  free 
as  some  of  the  politicians  told  them  they  were. 
The  fact  that  they  feared  losing  their  job  was, 
[174] 


Organizer. 

I  said,  a  compliment  neither  to  them  nor  to 
their  employer,  as  their  only  crime  was  to  act 
for  a  shorter  work  day.  I  suggested  that 
some  one  make  a  motion  to  appoint  the  com- 
mittee, not  because  I  feared  to  take  the  re- 
sponsibility of  doing  so,  but  so  that  we  could 
be  sure  it  was  the  unanimous  choice  of  the 
meeting.  That  was  done,  and  when  they 
came  to  nominate  their  committee,  it  was  a 
foregone  conclusion  that  I  should  be  chair- 
man. The  Secretary  of  the  Union  was  a  great 
dollar  and  cent  man.  He  thought  more  of  a 
dollar  than  of  human  life.  He  emphatically 
declined  to  serve  on  the  committee,  for  a  rea- 
son that  I  afterwards  discovered.  I  pointed 
out  to  him  that  he  could  not  constitutionally 
decline.  He  appealed  and  I  refused  to  recog- 
nize his  appeal,  on  parliamentary  grounds; 
informed  him  he  could  not  appeal  from  the 
Constitution.  He  was  elected  by  one  vote, 
and  had  to  serve  on  the  committee,  much  to 
his  disgust." 

The  men  wanted  Anton  to  "break  the  ice" 
in  the  demand  they  were  about  to  make — 
namely  that  the  nine-hour  day  with  the  same 
wages  as  obtained  in  the  ten-hour  day  should 
be  adopted.  One  day,  after  he  had  eaten  his 
[175] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

lunch,  Anton  went  to  see  the  employer,  leav- 
ing the  men  "on  eggs"  in  the  shop.  He  pre- 
sented his  credentials,  "sat  on  a  chair  with- 
out an  invitation,"  and  said  that  though  the 
boys  had  formed  a  Union,  it  was  not  a  sign 
of  discontent  with  their  employers;  that  he 
thought  organization  would  be  for  the  benefit 
of  both  employer  and  employee.  The  em- 
ployer replied  that  he  had  no  objection  to 
Unions  as  a  principle:  he  realized,  he  said, 
that  there  ought  to  be  a  shorter  day,  but  he 
pointed  out  the  injury  done  by  strikes,  and 
"pictured  the  gloomy  side  in  general."  An- 
ton replied  that  while  it  was  true  that  strikes 
often  did  harm,  the  employers  were  frequently 
responsible  for  them;  that  this  Union  was 
organized  to  strike  only  in  the  last  resort  and 
consequently  a  meeting  with  the  employer 
was  desired  by  the  committee.  To  this  the 
employer  readily  consented. 

At  the  meeting  the  demand  of  the  commit- 
tee for  a  nine-hour  day  with  the  same  wages 
they  had  received  under  the  ten-hour  day  was 
readily  granted  by  the  employers,  but  they 
thought  that  the  few  men  who  were  paid  as 
high  as  30  cents  an  hour  under  the  ten-hour 
day,  should  receive  33  cents  instead  of  33  1-3 
[176] 


Organizer. 

cents  an  hour  under  the  new  arrangement,  and 
that  the  1-3  cent  an  hour  should  be  added  to 
the  wages  of  the  men  who  were  paid  the  least. 
Anton  objected,  on  the  ground  that  in  that 
case  it  was  really  the  more  highly  paid  men 
who  were  paying  the  others,  rather  than  the 
employers.  Jones,  the  man  who  had  objected 
to  serve  on  the  committee,  sided  with  the  em- 
ployers, and  said  this  proposition  ought  to  be 
laid  before  the  Union.  This  was  done,  but 
in  the  meantime  Anton  discovered  that  Jones 
was  getting  higher  wages  than  was  known  to 
the  Union  and  his  objection  to  serve  on  the 
committee  and  his  sympathy  with  the  employ- 
ers was  thus  explained.  The  men  voted  to 
accept  no  reduction  of  wages  in  any  case ;  and 
then  the  employers  maintained  that  if  they  in- 
creased the  scale  of  wages  all  around  they 
would  be  paying  more  wages  than  the  shops 
in  Chicago,  on  account  of  the  expense  of  haul- 
ing the  material. 

Anton  determined  to  investigate  and  see  if 
this  contention  was  true.  But  Jones  again  op- 
posed him  and  this  time  Anton  lost  his  temper 
and  said  that  if  Jones  let  it  leak  out  that  An- 
ton was  making  this  investigation  he  would 
use  physical  force,  that  it  was  the  only  thing 
[177] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

to  do  with  such  a  selfish  coward.  He  then 
went  to  Chicago,  and  ascertained  that  the 
West  Chicago  shop  was  paying  less  rather 
than  more  than  the  other  shops.  He  had  the 
figures  exactly  and  with  these  he  was  soon  able 
to  get  what  he  wanted  from  his  employer. 
It  was  a  complete  victory  for  the  men. 

The  general  effect  of  this  victory  was 
marked.  There  came  to  the  town  a  general 
demand  for  Union  made  goods.  When  An- 
ton first  went  to  West  Chicago  there  were  no 
Union  made  cigars  in  the  place.  After  the 
Woodworkers  Union  was  organized,  every  to- 
bacco store  had  Union  made  cigars.  Anton 
was  a  great  man  in  this  city  of  2,000.  The 
men  were  grateful  to  him  for  the  extra  hour 
of  leisure  in  which  they  could  till  their  gar- 
dens or  develop  their  social  natures. 

For  example,  there  was  an  old  German 
common  laborer,  who  got  $1.40  a  day.  He 
was  very  religious,  and  when  Anton  began  his 
activity,  was  much  opposed  to  him. 

"He  was  a  good  old  fellow,"  said  Anton, 
"but  he  thought  I  was  lost  to  Paradise.  He 
was  afflicted  with  rheumatism  and  as  his  work 
was  to  carry  large  planks  I  had  to  help  him. 
I  had  charge  of  the  lumber  and  on  rainy  days, 
[178] 


Organizer. 

when  his  leg  pained  him,  I  arranged  for  him 
to  work  inside.  He  was  very  economical. 
For  lunch  he  had  a  couple  of  crusts,  a  soup 
bone,  or  a  piece  of  bologna;  and  a  cup  of 
coffee.  Whatever  crumbs  were  left  he  would 
wrap  up  in  the  same  paper  and  take  to  his 
chickens.  He  thought  I  was  wasteful  be- 
cause I  did  not  save  all  my  bread,  so  I  used 
to  give  him  my  crumbs,  to  take  home  to  his 
chickens.  After  I  had  succeeded  in  organiz- 
ing, the  old  gent  could  go  home  an  hour 
earlier  to  his  chickens.  He  saw  that  I  was  re- 
sponsible for  the  change,  and  began  to  think 
well  of  me.  Then  I  told  him  how  the  minis- 
ter of  his  church  had  opposed  the  forming  of 
the  Union.  He  was  dumbfounded  at  that, 
and  sorry,  but  told  me  with  tears  in  his  eyes 
that  I  was  all  right  and  no  matter  what  the 
minister  said  the  result  showed  for  itself.  My 
object  in  calling  his  attention  to  the  act  of  the 
minister  was  to  secure  his  influence  in 
strengthening  the  unionism  of  his  two 
nephews,  who  were  not  sufficiently  in  doubt  of 
the  infallibility  of  the  Bible  and  who  there- 
fore showed  signs  of  luke-warmness  to  our 
organization. 

"One  of  these  nephews  had  been  injured 
[179] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

while  working  for  the  N.  W.  R.  R.  company 
so  that  he  was  laid  up  for  ten  weeks  and  his 
efficiency  lost  for  life.  The  minister  made 
the  settlement  between  him  and  the  company 
— $200  when  it  ought  to  have  been  $5,000. 
After  paying  his  own  doctor's  bill  he  was  $90 
in  debt  at  the  end,  and  unable  to  get  a  job. 
This  is  what  the  minister  of  God  did  for  him. 
I  showed  up  to  the  old  uncle  the  hypocrisy  of 
ministers  and  the  greed  of  corporations  when 
I  heard  of  this  injustice.  I  also  went  to 
Chicago  and  consulted  Mr.  Darrow,  and 
asked  if  the  matter  could  not  be  re-opened. 
He  said  the  claim  was  outlawed,  but  he  made 
use  of  the  case  in  his  articles  in  The  American 
on  the  injustice  of  the  great  corporations  and 
their  puppets  the  lawyers.  I  was  a  great  ad- 
mirer of  these  articles :  they  were  so  sarcastic : 
he  always  took  a  dig  at  the  lawyers,  although 
he  was  a  lawyer  himself." 

In  the  fall,  following  the  victory  of  Anton's 
Union,  there  was  a  State  election  for  gov- 
ernor, and  also  a  village  election,  and  the  poli- 
ticians started  after  the  Labor  vote.  The  man 
who  ran  the  railroad  station  lunch  counter  was 
an  alderman. 

"One  day,"  said  Anton,  "this  man  came  to 
[180] 


Organizer. 

the  factory  in  a  buggy  with  a  salooti-keeper 
who  was  also  a  deputy-sheriff  and  the  prince 
of  gamblers  of  West  Chicago,  and  cunning  to 
obtain  the  dollar.  They  sent  in  a  box  of 
cigars  to  the  foreman  and  asked  him  to  pass 
them  around  to  the  men,  with  their  compli- 
ments. I  was  opposed  to  politicians  of  that 
kind,  and  I  also  noticed  that  there  was  no 
Union  label  on  the  cigar-box.  I  went  to  the 
boys,  who  each  had  received  a  cigar.  Their 
minds  had  been  sufficiently  agitated  against 
non-Union  goods  and  also  against  the  cheap- 
ness of  the  politicians.  I  pointed  out  to  them 
the  fact  that  their  intelligence  had  been  un- 
derestimated, and  each  man  took  his  cigar  and 
nailed  it  on  the  wall. 

"That  went  like  wild-fire  all  over  the  town. 
It  was  their  own  idea,  that's  the  beauty  of  it. 
Their  political  opponents  made  good  use  of 
this  story.  The  next  day  the  candidate  for 
Mayor  came  to  the  factory  with  Union  made 
cigars,  and  boasted  of  it.  When  I  told  him 
we  were  opposed  to  politicians,  he  said  he 
gave  the  cigars  not  to  get  votes  but  just  to 
meet  the  boys.  The  following  Saturday,  just 
before  election,  the  saloon-keeper  came 
around,  to  get  our  good-will  in  favor  of  his 
[i8i] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

candidate  for  Mayor;  told  us  how  kind  the 
man  was  and  how  much  he  had  done  for  the 
laboring  class.  I  told  him  I  was  not  con- 
vinced that  this  man  was  friendly  to  the  work- 
ing men,  but  that  if  he  could  prove  it,  I  would 
acknowledge  it.  So  I  and  three  of  the  bo)^ 
met  the  alderman  in  the  gambler's  saloon. 
Mr.  Alderman  was  half -drunk,  bought  drinks 
and  cigars  and  started  to  apologize  for  his 
blunder  in  the  matter  of  the  Union  cigars. 
He  thought  I  was  'it'  and  that  he  had  to  con- 
vince me.  When  he  was  through  with  his 
talk  I  said  it  was  difficult  to  believe  that  a 
man  had  such  an  awful  strong  feeling  towards 
the  workers  and  so  seldom  showed  it,  and 
when  he  did  show  it,  did  it  just  before 
election.  I  asked  him  if  he  did  not  think 
the  Unions  had  done  much  towards  raising 
the  standard  of  living  for  the  workingmen, 
and  in  abolishing  the  sweat-shop,  etc.  He 
answered,  'most  assuredly,  of  course,  most  un- 
doubtedly,' and  put  about  fourteen  emphases 
on  it.  The  sheriff  was  on  to  my  game,  but 
he  could  not  butt  in.  Then  I  asked  the  can- 
didate if  he  did  not  think  Union  labor  rep- 
resented the  certainty  of  greater  cleanliness 
in  the  material  than  non-Union.  This  he  ad- 
[182] 


Organizer. 

mitted  frankly  and  with  tremendous  drunken 
emphasis. 

"  'Then,'  said  I,  4f  you  really  sympathize 
with  the  cause,  why  is  it  that  you  didn't  assist 
the  Workers  by  purchasing  Union  made 
cigars?' 

"He  thought  I  had  reference  to  the  particu- 
lar cigars  that  were  nailed  on  the  wall,  and 
started  to  apologize  again,  but  I  interrupted 
him  and  said  that  I  was  willing  to  admit  it 
was  only  a  mistake  provided  he  could  take 
us  to  his  lunch  counter  and  show  us  one  box 
out  of  the  twenty-four  that  bore  the  Union 
label. 

He  realized  partly  that  I  had  him,  but 
he  was  so  drunk  that  he  took  us  to  the  lunch 
counter.  Sure  enough  he  did  not  have  a  sin- 
gle Union  label  cigar. 

"  'As  far  as  I  am  concerned,'  I  said,  'I  am 
not  convinced  that  you  are  over-burdened  in 
your  interest  for  the  cause  of  the  wage-work- 
ers.' 

"When  election  came  he  got  the  lowest 
vote  of  anybody  on  the  ticket.  The  City 
Mayor  who  had  refused  to  let  us  have  the 
hall  was  also  badly  defeated.  He  would  not 
speak  to  me  fof  months.  I  was  tickled  to 
[183] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

death  and  filled  with  glory.  The  friends  of 
the  defeated  shunned  me." 

Anton,  although  he  is  a  trade-unionist,  felt 
that  the  interests  of  the  workingmen  were  op- 
posed to  the  interests  of  the  employers:  al- 
though to  a  certain  extent  he  felt  that  the 
labor  situation  was  the  crux  of  a  class  strug- 
gle, yet  he  has  never  carried  this  feeling  as 
far  as  the  Socialists.  He  oftens  makes  fun 
of  the  "class  conscious"  man  and  is  as  fully 
alive,  or  almost  so,  to  the  weaknesses  of  the 
workingman  as  he  is  to  those  of  the  employer. 
Though  he  is  belligerent  and  fiery,  he  can  see 
good  in  a  man,  even  though  he  be  an  em- 
ployer. This  was  shown  during  his  life  at 
West  Chicago,  when  he  was  apparently  the 
big  man  of  the  town. 

One  of  the  employers  of  the  shop  where 
Anton  worked,  the  shop  he  had  organized, 
was  told  by  his  doctor  that  he  would  have 
to  live  on  a  farm,  on  account  of  his  health. 
One  day,  at  the  lunch  hour,  he  went  to  the 
men  and  told  them  he  was  going  away. 

"He  was  a  kindly  man,"  said  Anton,  "and 

he  began  to  cry.     He  told  about  how  hard 

he  had  worked  to  build  up  the  business  and 

said  that  if  the  men  had  not  treated  him  so 

[184I 


Organizer. 

well,  he  could  not  have  been  so  successful. 
His  emotion  touched  the  feelings  of  the  men. 
They  could  hardly  make  a  reply.  After  work 
I  called  a  shop-meeting  of  the  boys  and  we 
arranged  a  surprise  party  for  the  employer, 
took  up  a  collection  and  bought  a  diamond 
stud  as  a  present.  We  had  enough  money 
left  for  beer  and  cigars.  Then  we  all 
marched  together  to  the  man's  house.  He 
was  completely  surprised  and  much  moved. 
I  had  been  appointed  to  speak,  and  I  said: 
'Mr.  Toastmaster  and  friends:  No  one  is 
more  responsible  for  our  presence  here  to- 
night than  you,  Mr.  Skinner.  Therefore  I 
shall  direct  my  remarks  to  you  in  particular. 
Neither  the  millions*  of  a  Rockefeller  nor  the 
wisdom  of  a  Shakespeare  coupled  with  the 
experience  of  a  Darwin  could  obtain  for  any 
man  that  feeling  of  fraternity  that  bounds 
within  the  breasts  of  all  who  are  here,  for 
you,  Mr.  Skinner.  Neither  was  it  because 
you  were  an  employer,  for  employers  have 
gone  out  of  business  before  and  the  men  have 
been  glad  of  their  departure,  but  rather  be- 
cause your  daily  avocation  in  life  and  your 
attitude  towards  your  fellow  men  were  con- 
sistent with  that  principle  that  is  so  lofty, 
[185] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

equal  rights  to  all  and  special  privileges  to 
none.  Whether  consciously  or  unconsciously 
you  have  demonstrated  the  philosophy  of 
Tom  Paine  when  he  said :  'The  most  formid- 
able v^eapon  against  error  of  all  kinds  is  rea- 
son.' We  are  pleased  to  have  worked  with 
you,  to  have  associated  with  you  and  I  feel 
sure  that  your  spirit  of  toleration  will  ever  re- 
main an  influence  with  all  of  us  and  make  us 
more  considerate  to  our  fellow  men.  Though 
you  have  risen  far  above  the  average  in  the 
industrial  world,  yet  you  have  always  ab- 
stained from  that  dignity  clothed  in  hypocrisy 
which  fails  to  have  any  sympathy  with  those 
who  perhaps  are  more  unfortunate.  We  have 
never  known  you  to  discriminate  against  any 
man  because  of  his  religious  beliefs,  nor  be- 
cause of  his  political  affiliations,  and  it  is 
men  of  your  character  and  temperament  who 
are  the  forerunners  of  the  ideal  society,  where 
man's  inhumanity  to  man  will  be  reduced  to 
the  minimum  and  human  happiness  elevated 
to  the  maximum.  This  has  ever,  in  all  ages, 
been  the  song  of  the  poet  and  the  dream  of 
the  philosopher.  You  can  rest  assured  that 
while  we  regret  to  have  you  leave  us,  yet  it 
would  be  extremely  selfish  on  our  part  not  to 
[i86] 


Organizer. 

be  cheerful  under  the  circumstances,  since  it 
is  better  for  you  to  go.  As  an  evidence  of 
our  appreciation  we  give  to  you  a  small  token 
of  our  affection;  may  it  be  a  sign  to  you  and 
to  your  friends  and  family,  when  you  have  left 
this  village,  that  they  who  knew  you  best, 
your  employees,  can  say  truthfully:  *He  has 
gone,  but  he  was  a  man.'  " 

"He  cried  like  a  child  before  I  got  half 
through.  Then  we  sang  songs  and  drank 
beer.  I  really  loved  that  man.  He  was  ex- 
actly what  I  said.  My  speech  was  printed  in 
the  West  Chicago  paper  and  went  all  over 
town.  Maggie  was  as  proud  as  a  peacock 
when  she  saw  it  in  the  paper,  and  sent  it 
home  to  Clinton.  Then  they  thought  in  Clin- 
ton I  was  not  so  much  of  a  hobo  after  all. 
Everybody  thought  it  was  a  fine  speech  to  be 
made  by  a  man  who  worked  in  a  factory. 
The  Woodworker  printed  a  mere  statement 
that  I  had  presented  a  diamond  stud  to  the 
employer  and  my  radical  friends  in  Chicago 
were  horrified  at  the  thought  that  I  had 
turned  a  complete  summersault  in  my  attitude 
towards  the  bosses.  The  radicals  are  in  some 
ways  as  narrow-minded  as  the  majority  of  the 
capitalists." 

[187] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

In  that  little  gathering  at  the  employer's 
house  a  great  deal  of  humanity  was  repre- 
sented. There  were  Germans,  Swedes,  Irish, 
Scotch,  English,  Americans,  Bohemians, 
Catholics,  Lutherans,  Methodists,  Baptists, 
Congregationalists,  a  Salvation  Army  man. 
Democrats,  Republicans,  Socialists,  People's 
Party  men  and  an  anarchist.  The  anarchist 
was  Anton,  the  most  important  figure  on  that 
occasion,  and  the  most  tolerant.  They  all 
differed  in  everything  except  in  the  need  of 
Unionism,  and  even  the  employer  agreed  with 
them  on  this  point;  and  in  the  essential  feel- 
ings of  kindness  and  of  human  solidarity. 


[i88] 


CHAPTER  IX. 

Delegate  to  New  York. 

"Nothing  on  earth,"  said  Anton,  "could 
stop  the  workers,  if  they  were  active  in  their 
own  interests.  Only  about  thirty  per  cent  of 
them  are  organized,  and  of  this  thirty  per 
cent  only  about  four  per  cent  are  active ;  and 
of  these  four  per  cent  only  about  one  per  cent 
are  really  aggressive.  If  one-third  of  those 
who  are  now  organized  were  active,  the  eight- 
hour  day  would  be  universal  in  four  years. 
It  would  be  as  irresistible  as  an  earthquake." 

Anton's  feeling  for  the  need  of  activity  ac- 
counts for  a  good  deal  of  his  anarchistic,  as 
well  as  of  his  general  trades-union  agitation. 
The  laboring  masses,  he  feels,  are  inert  and 
need  constant  prodding  and  pricking.  The 
great  thing  is  to  make  them  morally  uncom- 
fortable, if  not  with  the  truth  then  with  ex- 
aggerations of  the  truth;  to  rouse  them  to  a 
sense  of  their  opportunities  and  excite  them 
with  a  prospect  of  more  abundant  life.  I 
[189] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

often  found  him  in  a  mood  when  he  would 
express  himself  very  one-sidedly  and  ex- 
tremely and  unjustly;  but  it  was  due  quite  as 
much  to  his  desire  to  "get  a  rise"  from  the 
phlegmatic  mass  as  to  his  balanced  conviction ; 
for  in  calmer  moods  he  would  think  and  talk 
more  justly.  He  never  seems,  however,  to 
enjoy  himself  so  much  as  when  he  throws  a 
moral  bomb,  so  to  speak,  either  at  a  conserva- 
tive capitalist,  a  politician,  a  minister  or  a 
timid  or  slow-going  laborer. 

He  was,  apparently,  especially  aggressive 
during  his  West  Chicago  experience.  "In 
the  meetings,"  he  said,  "I  went  the  limit. 
I  used  to  attack  government  on  every  occa- 
sion. I  wanted  to  take  away  the  deadening 
of  the  routine.  When  a  man  has  worked  in 
the  shop  all  day,  turning  out  with  the  help 
of  machinery  something  that  does  not  interest 
him,  that  has  no  variety  in  it,  he  wants  a 
change  when  he  gets  out:  he  wants  to  express 
himself,  he  wants  to  express  anything  that  has 
feeling,  whether  it  is  logical  or  not. 

"One  night  I  took  the  insane  asylum  as  my 
subject.  A  man  was  present  who  was  a  heavy 
drinker,  a  non-resisting  character  and  very  re- 
ligious. It  was  right  after  the  expose  of  the 
[190] 


Delegate  to  New  York. 

Kankakee  asylum  outrage,  where  the  warden 
had  made  an  insane  woman  pregnant.     This 
religious  drunkard  was  so  touched  by  my  re- 
marks that  he  began  to  weep  like  a  child. 
He  felt  that  he  had  been  partly  responsible 
for  his  own  daughter's  insanity.     I  had  tried 
in  my  speech  to  show  what  the  asylum  would 
be  in  a  state  of  free  society  where  the  insane 
were  treated  for  the  benefit  of  the  insane,  and 
not  locked  away  so  as  not  to  interfere  with 
money-making  and  other  noble  interests  of 
the  sane  in  a  state  of  free  society.     He  induced 
me  to  meet  his  minister,  whom  he  represented 
as  a  kind  of  Christ.     So  the  next  Sunday  night 
I  went  to  Church,  as  I  did  not  feel  like  going 
to  the  Saloon.     I  was  conspicuous  in  the  au- 
dience, because  my  sense  of  honesty  prevented 
me  from  rising  when  the  others  rose,  or  kneel- 
ing when  they  kneeled,  for  I  did  not  want  to 
deceive  them. 

"After  the  meeting,  the  minister  shook  my 
hand,  and  asked  me  if  I  was  a  Christian.  I 
said  I  would  like  to  answer  by  asking  him  a 
question.  'Are  you  a  Christian?'  I  asked. 
I  saw  by  his  face  and  the  faces  of  the  women 
that  my  question  was  considered  improper. 
He  said  he  was  a  Christian,  and  then  I  re- 
[191] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

plied:  *I  am  a  Christian  as  far  as  society  per- 
mits me  to  be  and  perhaps  to  a  small:  degree 
further.'  I  called  his  attention  to  what  he 
had  said  in  his  sermon:  he  had  prayed  that 
there  be  none  within  the  sound  of  his  voice 
who  would  gather  in  dens  of  the  devil  and 
under  the  influence  of  sinners. 

"  *It  is  a  little  unkind  of  you/  I  said,  'to 
insist  that  anyone  who  associates  with  sinners 
is  very  different  morally  from  the  people  in 
the  Church.  I  am  not  aware  that  you  are 
running  a  boarding-house.  There  are  many 
who  have  to  stop  in  boarding-houses  and 
hotels  which  are  filled  with  sinners.  I  my- 
self have  slept  in  box-cars,  and  I  find  the 
classification  there  is  the  same  as  in  hotels, 
boarding-houses  and  churches.  Will  you  sug- 
gest to  me  where  I  may  stop  to-night,  as  my 
family  are  not  in  town  and  I  am  staying  at 
the  hotel,  which  is  full  of  sinners.  Don't  you 
think,  sir,  that  every  man  and  woman  is  con- 
trolled to  a  very  large  extent  by  their  environ- 
ment? To  what  extent  can  a  common  labor- 
ing man  who  receives  from  $1.50  to  $2  a  day, 
and  has  a  family  of  from  two  to  six  children, 
to  what  extent  can  he  choose  the  locations  of 
his  home?  Is  he  not  forced  to  live  in  a  locality 
[192] 


Delegate  to  New  York. 

of  so-called  vile  people,  or  infidels  or  unortho- 
dox? It  is  a  question  of  rent,  of  making  both 
ends  meet.  Therefore  the  income  determines 
largely  the  child's  environment.  It  is  very 
hard  for  me  to  accept  a  religion  or  a  creed 
that  overlooks  these  things,  and  when  a  child 
grows  up  in  such  surroundings,  the  Church 
condemns  and  criticizes  it  and  society  sends 
it  to  jail  or  makes  it  work  for  small  wages, 
because  it  has  not  learned  anything.  The 
course  of  this  child  in  life  is  sufficiently  pain- 
ful, but  after  the  end  of  this  miserable  ex- 
istence, the  Church  sends  it  to  Hell.  It  is 
impossible  for  you,  sir,  even  faintly  to  imagine 
the  great  satisfaction  I  feel  in  being  absolutely 
certain  that  this  is  mythical,  pure  and  simple.' 
That  settled  him  and  the  audience,  too.  He 
told  me  to  go  to  the  hotel  and  think  it  over. 
I  actually  felt  like  telling  him  that  if  most 
Church  people  had  to  choose  between  clean 
beds  and  sinners  on  the  one  hand;  or  lousy 
beds  and  Christians  on  the  other  hand,  they 
would  take  the  sinners  every  time.  But  I 
didn't  want  to  embarrass  him  too  much;  es- 
pecially as  I  began  to  see,  and  had  for  some 
time,  that  nobody  in  West  Chicago  was  inter- 
ested in  my  line  of  thought;  except  the  work- 
[193] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

ing  people.  I  could  explain  to  them  and  they 
were  sympathetic,  because  they  felt  my  pas- 
sion for  human  solidarity  in  all  my  talk.  But 
otherwise  I  was  very  much  alone.  Even  the 
more  belligerent  of  the  workingmen  some- 
times joked  me.  'The  anarchist,'  said  a  Pol- 
ock  once,  in  the  meeting,  'will  never  get 
elected.'  He  reminded  me  of  the  policeman 
who  told  me  he  liked  the  Socialists,  but  that 
there  were  not  enough  of  them." 

He  "took  a  fall,"  too,  out  of  the  County 
Commissioner  of  Charities.  He  raised  in  the 
Union  a  subscription  of  $50  for  a  laborer 
with  a  bad  leg,  and  then  went  to  the  com- 
missioner with  a  petition.  That  functionary 
looked  glum,  and  said  that  the  board  of  chari- 
ties took  care  of  those  cases.  Anton  replied 
that  the  board  evidently  overlooked  some  peo- 
ple who  were  in  need.  "I  have  come  to  the 
conclusion,"  said  Anton  to  him,  "that  if  the 
poor  did  not  look  after  the  county  commis- 
sioners, those  commissioners  could  not  go  so 
often  to  California  on  a  vacation;  the  work- 
ing people  support  you  fellows  just  as  they 
do  the  lawyers,  doctors,  preachers,  politicians 
and  all  the  other  grafters,  but  if  you  are  called 
upon  to  help  the  poor,  you  regard  the  matter 
[194] 


Delegate  to  New  York. 

as  pure  charity."  Anton  really  seemed  sur- 
prised that  the  county  commissioner  got  angry 
at  this  and  said  he  had  been  insulted.  "I 
told  him  I  was  sorry  he  was  county  commis- 
sioner. I  sympathized  with  him  to  that  ex- 
tent." This  conversation  was  circulated 
about  the  town,  and  at  the  next  election,  the 
county  commissioner  lost  his  job. 

It  was  not  long  after  this  that  Anton,  too, 
lost  his  job  and  went  back  to  Chicago.  Jones, 
the  obnoxious  secretary  of  the  Union,  had  be- 
come foreman  and  had  resigned  his  position 
in  the  Union.  With  this  man  Anton  could 
not  work  harmoniously.  *When  he  became 
boss,"  said  Anton,  "he  was  tyrannical.  He 
was  a  dollar  and  cent  man  and  was  not  a  good 
mechanic.  He  had  no  judgment,  not  the 
slightest  idea  of  how  to  approach  men,  to  get 
the  best  results.  He  was  therefore  unpopular 
and  I  liked  to  ball  him  out.  On  Labor  Day 
I  went  home  to  Clinton  with  my  family  for  a 
visit,  and  did  not  return  till  the  following 
Wednesday.  Then  he  started  to  raise  Cain; 
and  told  me  to  do  what  amounted  to  four 
days  work  in  one.  I  told  him  if  he  was  a 
mechanic  he  would  know  it  was  impossible. 
Then  I  called  him  everything  I  could  think  of 
[195] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

in  the  way  of  cheapness.  The  only  thing  that 
could  influence  him  besides  money,  I  re- 
marked, was  the  Pope.  *I  have  some  hope 
for  you,'  I  said,  'for  not  even  the  Pope  can 
move  you  as  far  as  the  dollar,  and  I  have 
more  respect  for  the  American  dollar,  bad  as 
it  is,  than  for  the  Pope  of  Rome.'  He  got 
white  as  a  sheet,  and  I  threw  off  my  overalls 
and  quit." 

Anton  did  not  have  a  dollar  in  the  world, 
when  he  thus  impulsively  quit  work  in  West 
Chicago.  Easy  as  it  seemed  for  him  to  throw 
off  his  overalls,  it  was  not  such  a  simple  mat- 
ter as  formerly.  He  was  gradually  striking 
his  roots.  The  influence  of  Maggie  was  a 
steadily  regulating  one.  He  had  become  a 
good  mechanic,  thirty  years  old,  and  his  blood 
was  cooler,  so  that  he  felt  more  and  more  the 
responsibility  of  his  family;  and  of  his  work 
in  the  Union. 

He  quit  work  in  West  Chicago  on  a  Satur- 
day morning;  and  on  the  following  Thursday 
he  secured  the  position  he  has  held  ever  since. 
It  is  a  good  job  in  every  way,  the  best  he  has 
ever  had.  The  wages  are  good,  the  foreman 
is  congenial ;  and  the  new  local  he  belongs  to 
is  composed  of  some  of  the  most  vigorous 
[196] 


Delegate  to  New  York. 

men  in  the  labor  movement.  His  work  as 
an  organizer  in  West  Chicago  had  given  him 
a  reputation  among  active  labor  men  in  the 
city;  and  he  had  not  been  in  Chicago  two 
weeks  when  he  was  elected  delegate  from  his 
local  to  the  Chicago  Federation  of  Labor. 

It  was  at  the  time  when  the  trouble  be- 
tween the  Woodworkers  and  the  Carpenters 
was  to  come  up  before  the  Federation.  "As 
I  had  considerable  gift  of  gab  and  some  pol- 
icy I  was  made  chairman  of  the  Woodwork- 
ers' delegation,"  he  said,  "and  then  there 
came  a  long,  technical  fight,  about  jurisdic- 
tion." I  will  not  follow  him  in  this  fight. 
It  was  very  complex  and  not  at  all  inspiring, 
as  it  involved  no  general  principles  and  only 
small  politics  and  local  jurisdiction  interests, 
Anton,  although  he  was  very  active  for  the 
Woodworkers,  whose  organization  the  Car- 
penters were  attempting  to  absorb,  felt  keenly 
the  routine  and  ungenerous  character  of  the 
proceedings.  During  the  course  of  his  three 
or  four  years'  experience  in  the  Federation  he 
has  often  taken  the  floor  to  protest  against  the 
tendency  of  that  body  to  waste  its  energies 
in  unimportant  jurisdictions  fights  when  so 
many  broad  principles  of  labor  policy  de- 
[197] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

manded  the  most  vigorous  and  united  atten- 
tion. 

The  President  of  the  Federation  at  that 
time  was  a  Carpenter,  and  the  result  was  that 
"the  machine"  was  against  the  Woodworkers, 
who  were  finally  worsted  in  that  particular 
phase  of  the  fight  which  had  been  going  on 
all  over  the  country  between  these  allied 
trades.  As  far  as  Anton  was  concerned,  his 
vigorous  speeches  in  the  Federation  helped 
materially  to  bring  him  into  general  notice  as 
a  rising  man  in  the  local  labor  situation ;  and 
not  long  after  he  was  elected  Chicago  dele- 
gate to  the  New  York  Convention  of  Wood- 
workers. 

"In  that  convention,"  he  said,  "I  had  a 
distinct  advantage  over  those  delegates  who 
had  a  political  mind.  I  was  not  a  demo- 
crat, a  republican  nor  a  socialist,  and  so  I  could 
reason  from  more  than  one  point  of  view. 
If  a  man  is  an  anarchist  and  does  not  carry 
things  too  far  he  has  a  great  practical  ad- 
vantage in  debate  over  everybody  else.  They 
put  me  on  the  most  important  committees  and 
I  soon  saw  that  my  area  of  thought  was 
broader  than  most  of  the  men  I  came  in  con- 
tact with.  I  had  by  that  time  met  the  promi- 
[198] 


Delegate  to  New  York. 

nent  radicals,  men  like  Turner  and  Isaak;  and 
I  had  heard  Darrow  and  read  his  books  and 
speeches  in  labor  cases,  and  I  found  more  and 
more  a  narrowness  in  the  trades-unionist 
that  took  away  from  me  my  pleasure  in  the 
movement,  but  not  from  my  interest  in  it.  It 
seemed  important,  but  not  so  exciting  as  at 
first.  In  several  of  the  committees  I  sent  in 
a  minority  report  to  the  convention;  I  found 
considerable  jealousy  in  the  other  committee 
members,  but  I  had  the  satisfaction  of  having 
the  convention  reject  the  majority  reports  and 
accept  mine,  the  minority  report. 

"But  I  made  one  speech  that  was  a  failure. 
I  had  invited  some  of  my  radical  friends  in 
New  York  to  hear  me.  Isaak  was  there  then, 
and  Emma  Goldman.  I  felt  at  that  time 
that  these  people  were  superior  to  me  intellec- 
tually, and  that  thought  cast  a  damper  over 
me.  I  can  speak  best  in  a  mass  meeting  of 
workingmen  where  none  of  the  speakers  are 
superior  to  me.  The  Union  is  a  great  field 
for  experience  in  speaking  and  in  debate,  and 
I  afterwards  learned  to  speak  before  the  radi- 
cals in  Chicago  with  confidence.  But  I  was 
rattled  on  that  occasion  in  New  York  and  by 
my  speech  almost  destroyed  the  good  impres- 
[199] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

sion  I  had  made  by  my  committee  reports. 
Afterwards,  I  saw  a  good  deal  of  Emma 
Goldman,  and  while  I  respect  her  courage 
and  her  energy,  I  think  her  ideas  are  too  wild 
and  too  religious.  She  is  of  a  very  positive 
disposition  and  believes  that  her  theory  is  just 
right  and  everything  else  just  wrong.  I  have 
my  own  troubles  with  this  positiveness,  too,  so 
I  can't  be  too  hard  on  her." 

Anton  is  interested  in  almost  anything  hu- 
man which  shows  itself  honestly  and  squarely 
to  him.  He  is  filled,  of  course,  with  the  criti- 
cism of  our  social  organism  shared  with  him 
by  every  intelligent  workingman.  He  is  in- 
terested in  many  things  that  seem  half-baked, 
but  he  is  nevertheless  not  blinded  to  their  limi- 
tations or  to  the  charm  of  other  and  possibly 
better  things.  He  is  alive  in  every  way. 
The  "radicals"  are  interesting  to  him  mainly 
because  they  express — although  generally  in 
an  anaemic  way — some  of  the  principles  which 
he  as  an  active  worker  feels  are  beginning  to 
form  in  the  heart  of  the  people.  But  person- 
ally, when  he  is  among  them,  he  is  like  a  bull 
in  a  clover  field.  They  are  gentle,  quiet,  pale, 
reasonable  within  their  limitations,  rather 
monotonous;  he  is  stormy,  aggressive,  varied, 
[  200] 


Delegate  to  New  York. 

complex,  sometimes  vulgar,  more  often  fine 
and  truly  delicate,  often  above  their  heads 
though  his  language  is  ungrammatical.  He 
frightens  and  puzzles  them.  He  goes  to  them 
largely  as  a  change  from  the  activity  of  his 
trades-union  life  and  also  because  he  loves 
the  ideal  of  freedom. 

During  this  brief  stay  of  his  in  New  York, 
his  character  made  a  keen  impression  on  peo- 
ple whom  I  afterwards  met  in  that  city.  One 
of  them,  a  woodworker,  too,  and  an  anarchist 
in  tendency,  a  heavy  drinker,  a  man  utterly 
careless  in  habits  and  dress,  and  most  repul- 
sive on  first  acquaintance,  but  afterwards  fas- 
cinating because  of  his-  ideas,  never-failing 
temperament  and  genuine  experience,  spoke 
to  me  of  Anton  as  "a  powerful  fellow." 

"The  real  'radicals,'  he  said,  'are  in  the 
labor  movement;  those  hanging  on  the  outside 
began  with  the  movement,  too,  but  then  be- 
came too  weak  for  it.  Anton  has  too  many 
ideas  to  please  the  theoretical  anarchists  who 
have  lost  touch  with  life.  My  experience  is 
that  the  radicals  make  a  mistake  in  neglecting 
the  trades-union  movement.  If  they  are 
trades-unionists  they  can  have  a  hall  to  speak 
in  undisturbed  by  the  police.  If  you  can  talk 
[201] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

sense  there,  they  will  listen  to  you  no  matter 
how  radical  you  talk.  You  can't  talk  high- 
falutin,  but  some  men  have  the  gift  of 
saying  things  simply.  Most  anarchists  get 
their  words  from  books,  so  when  they  talk 
they  are  high-falutin;  but  if  they  would  talk 
right,  they  could  say  everything  they  want,  in 
the  trades-union  meetings;  for  the  trade- 
unionists  accept  all  radical  ideas,  if  they  are 
not  labeled,  and  are  not  high-falutin. 

"It  is  natural  that  all  radical  ideas  should 
start  with  the  working  class.  Serfs  and  slaves 
think  more  than  anybody  else.  The  other 
people  don't  need  to  think.  Give  a  man  a 
job  and  he  generally  stops  thinking.  They 
think  all  together  because  there  is  solidarity 
among  them.  Each  man's  thought  is  the 
thought  of  all.  There  is  solidarity  among 
them  because  they  are  weak.  Ants  get  to- 
gether, but  lions  remain  alone."  Anton  is  a 
man  who  expresses  the  laboring  man  at  heart, 
with  more  energy  and  intelligence  than  most 
of  the  radicals,  partly  because  he  is  near  them 
and  works  with  them. 

Yet  this  vigorous-minded  workingman  felt 
abashed  when  called  on  to  speak  before  peo- 
ple of  more  education  but  many  of  them  of 
[  202  ] 


Delegate  to  New  York. 

far  less  vitality  of  thought.  His  failure  in 
the  speech  seemed  to  have  impressed  Anton 
more  vividly  than  anything  else  in  his  visit 
to  New  York. 

When  he  returned  to  Chicago,  he  found 
that  his  prestige  was  still  greater,  and  they 
wanted  him  to  run  for  business  agent.  "I 
had  a  good  position,"  he  said,  "but  to  be  busi- 
ness agent  would  mean  a  money  sacrifice ;  for 
a  business  agent  has  to  spend  money  like  water 
in  the  saloons.  Maggie  was  opposed  to  my 
running;  but  I  wanted  to  have  the  experience, 
and  thought  I  could  be  a  better  agitator  if  I 
could  spend  all  my  time  at  it,  and  not  need 
to  work  in  the  shop.  So  I  ran  for  business 
agent,  and  although  I  was  popular,  I  was  de- 
feated, as  I  had  been  before,  and  for  the  same 
reason.  I  was  too  independent.  I  was  con- 
vinced that  the  office  should  seek  the  man. 
I  had  a  contempt  for  political  tricks.  It  was 
repulsive  to  me  to  ask  for  anything. 

"Soon  after  that  I  was  elected  President 
of  my  local  Union,  against  my  wishes.  I  did 
not  want  the  office,  and  nobody  else  did.  I 
thanked  them,  in  a  speech,  for  giving  me  an 
office  I  did  not  want.  It  was  in  many  ways  a 
disagreeable  job.  The  workingman  can  main- 
[203] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

tain  order  in  Church  or  in  a  lodge-meeting. 
But  in  a  local  Union  he  thinks  he  is  the  whole 
cheese,  and  will  do  as  he  pleases.  It  is  hard 
for  the  President  to  keep  order.  My  Union 
was  composed  of  1,400  men  of  mixed  nation- 
alities; and  there  is  a  very  rough  element 
among  them.  There  was  an  Irishman  who 
gave  more  trouble  than  anybody  else.  He 
was  always  drunk  at  the  meetings  and  ill- 
tempered.  He  was  an  interrupter  and  was 
willing  to  vote  money  out  of  the  treasury  to 
help  a  friend.  He  used  all  kinds  of  dirty, 
vile  language,  and  previous  Presidents  had 
not  been  able  to  manage  him. 

"This  Irishman  had  an  idea  he  was  respon- 
sible for  my  election  and  asked  me  to  make 
him  door-keeper,  who  gets  35  cents  every 
meeting.  I  told  him  that  the  first  time  I 
presided  I  would  make  a  statement  before  the 
Union  on  what  the  conduct  of  the  meeting 
should  be.  On  that  occasion  I  recommended 
dispensing  with  a  regular  door-keeper,  that 
the  chairman  appoint  a  sergeant-at-arms  every 
Monday  and  that  he  act  without  being  paid ; 
so  much  would  be  saved  for  the  treasury.  All 
agreed,  except  the  old  Irishman.  Hence- 
forth, he  was  opposed  to  me,  for  he  wanted 
[204] 


Delegate  to  New  York. 

that  money  for  three  whiskeys  every  meeting. 
I  informed  the  men  that  I,  as  President, 
would  forget  that  I  had  any  personal  friends. 
I  thanked  them  for  the  honor  of  electing  me 
to  an  office  that  nobody  else  wanted,  but  I 
hoped  that  time  would  never  come  when  the 
President  of  a  local  Union  would  be  a  salaried 
officer;  they  should  always  select  a  man  who 
could  command  their  respect,  but  remember 
there  were  times  when  it  was  a  crime  for  the 
presiding  officer  to  have  the  respect  of  certain 
men.  I  told  them  I  should  enforce  the  laws 
of  the  Constitution,  bad  or  good,  and  then  if 
they  did  not  like  them,  they  could  repeal 
them. 

"A  certain  question  was  being  discussed, 
when  the  old  Irishman,  who  was  tipsy,  got  up 
and  wanted  to  talk.  I  banged  the  gavel,  tell- 
ing him  he  must  confine  himself  to  the  ques- 
tion. The  custom  had  been  to  repeal  any 
fines  inflicted  by  the  chairman  for  actions  that 
were  out  of  order.  The  Irishman  knew  that, 
and  would  not  sit  down.  He  called  me  So- 
cialist, anarchist  and  tyrant.  I  appointed  a 
committee  of  three  to  escort  him  from  the  hall. 
They  tussled  with  him,  he  agreed  to  behave, 
and  was  given  another  chance.  Soon  after- 
[205] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

wards,  he  arose  and  took  a  similar  aggressive 
and  unparliamentary  attitude.  I  appointed 
the  committee  again,  and  they  threw  him  out. 
Always  after  that  he  was  very  gentle,  and  the 
meetings  were  orderly.  One  can  be  an  an- 
archist in  theory,  as  a  protest,  but  when  it 
comes  to  do  the  work,  there  must  be  order. 

"My  anarchism  helped  me  to  make  an  im- 
pression. I  began  to  meet  the  big  fellows, 
men  like  John  Mitchell  and  Sam  Gompers, 
and  I  found  that  my  acquaintance  with  radi- 
cal ideas,  slight  as  it  then  was,  helped  me  with 
these  men,  no  matter  how  conservative  they 
were — and  they  always  seem  more  conserva- 
tive than  they  are  in  reality.  There  is 
no  conception  so  close  to  trades-unionism  as 
anarchism,  for  in  these  Unions  there  are  so 
many  different  elements,  nationalities,  creeds 
and  ideas  that  there  is  no  common  ground 
except  anarchism;  provided  they  don't  know 
it.  If  the  anarchist,  that  is,  the  extreme  pro- 
tester, does  not  call  himself  an  anarchist,  he 
occupies  in  the  trades-unionism  a  logical  and 
strong  position,  but  he  must  not  advertise  it." 

Anton's  growing  importance  in  the  move- 
ment was  shown  by  his  election  as  President 
of  the  Woodworkers'  Council,  which  repre- 
[206] 


Delegate  to  New  York. 

sented  all  the  local  Unions  in  the  city.  In 
this  position  he  continued  to  act  with  his 
usual  independence.  Soon  he  had  the  walk- 
ing delegates  against  him  because  of  his  re- 
fusal to  extend  them  special  privileges  on  the 
floor  of  the  council. 

"I  was  strong,"  he  said,  "with  the  rank  and 
file,  because  I  used  my  sarcasm  against  the 
officers  who  tried  to  perpetuate  their  posi- 
tions. I  was  weak  with  the  officers  for  the 
same  reason;  and  they  to  the  end  will  always 
get  the  victory,  for  they  keep  at  it,  from  mo- 
tives of  business  or  ambition,  while  the  crowd 
is  moved  by  impulse  which  soon  dies  away. 

"It  was  about  the  time  that  Darrow's  Open 
Shop  was  published;  and  it  caused  many  a 
discussion  in  our  Union.  I  sold  800  copies 
of  it,  and  the  talk  it  made  did  as  much  good 
as  the  actual  reading  of  it.  The  men  like  to 
discuss  this  question  as  much  as  the  employers, 
and  they  both  regard  it  as  a  moral  issue ;  and 
yet  that  is  silly.  It  is  simply  a  question  of 
power  and  advantage.  The  bosses  yell  that 
every  man  ought  to  have  a  chance,  and  that 
the  shops  must  be  closed  to  nobody;  while  the 
men  maintain  that  it  is  immoral  for  the  men 
to  be  so  blind  as  not  to  organize.  The  bosses 
[207] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

are  more  hypocritical  about  it,  for  they  say 
they  want  the  open  shop  for  the  benefit  of  the 
non-Union  men.  It  is  to  laugh,  and  every- 
body knows  it." 

Anton,  after  the  part  he  took  in  the  Car- 
penter-Woodworker debate,  became  active  in 
the  affairs  of  the  Chicago  Federation  of  La- 
bor, and  was  appointed  a  member  of  the 
organization  committee  and  at  a  later  time  of 
the  charter  committee.  His  experience  as  an 
active  worker  in  this  central  labor  body  was 
not  one  conducive  to  a  purely  optimistic  way 
of  looking  at  the  situation.  "A  great  portion 
of  the  worst  element,"  he  said,  "is  elected  to 
the  offices  and  committees.  Things  are  bet- 
ter now,  but  there  was  a  time  when  the  Presi- 
dent of  the  Federation  always  drifted  into  a 
political  job.  Office  in  the  Federation  was  a 
stepping  stone  to  politics.  This  was  largely 
due  to  the  ignorance  of  the  politicians;  to 
that  is  due  the  prestige  of  the  labor  grafter, 
for  the  average  trades-unionist  has  very  little 
political  influence,  a  thing  the  politicians  are 
very  slow  in  learning. 

"The  fear  of  expose  tends  to  give  certain 
men  influence,  the  Lily  Whites,  the  reformers 
who  do  doubtful  good  and  are  often  really 
[208] 


Delegate  to  New  York. 

dishonest.  Nearly  every  politician  howls 
against  the  graft  of  the  others,  so  that  unless  he 
can  mention  names,  he  has  little  influence  as 
a  reformer — he  is  not  dangerous  to  the 
crooked  politician.  I  was  known  to  be  against 
the  machine  element,  whether  it  was  a  graft- 
ing element  or  a  so-called  reform  element.  I 
was  against  the  machine  as  a  machine.  It 
was  not  democratic  and  did  not  satisfy  me  as 
an  anarchist." 


[209] 


CHAPTER  X. 

Chicago  Spirit  and  Its  Cause. 

It  was  at  about  this  point  in  his  career  that 
I  first  met  Anton.  He  was  then  President  of 
his  local,  President  of  the  Woodworkers' 
Council,  and  active  delegate  to  the  Chicago 
Federation  of  Labor;  it  was  just  previous  to 
an  important  strike  of  the  Woodworkers,  to 
the  Madden  reform  fight  in  the  Federation, 
to  the  personal  conflict  which  led  up  to  An- 
ton's election  as  Chicago  delegate  to  the  In- 
ternational Labor  Congress  at  Pittsburg. 
The  great  Teamsters'  strike  was  under  way; 
Mayor  Dunne  was  in  the  midst  of  his  mu- 
nicipal ownership  efforts,  and  "labor"  was  al- 
most the  only  topic  of  talk  in  the  town.  The 
city  was  bitter  in  its  side-taking;  and  yet  I 
was  impressed  with  the  relative  broadness 
and  toleration  extending  through  the  social 
sections;  impressed  with  the  way  the  working- 
man,  the  "common "  man  had  imposed  his 
point  of  view  to  a  relatively  great  extent  upon 
[210] 


Chicago  Spirit  and  Its  Cause. 

the  entire  comunity.  Here,  indeed,  the  la- 
borer is  more  at  home  than  is  the  rule  in  cap- 
italistic communities.  It  is  the  only  big  city 
I  know  where  he  has  made  an  atmosphere  for 
himself.  Here  he  begins  to  abound  in  his 
own  sense,  and  to  feel  the  excitement  of 
thought.  Here  he  can  nourish  his  personal- 
ity, can  express  himself.  Here  he  has  his 
clubs,  his  centres  of  activity,  and  he  is  filled 
with  democratic  hope.  More  than  all,  here 
he  has  communicated  his  needs  and  his  ideals 
to  the  general  community,  so  that  his  laws  and 
the  laws  on  the  statute  books  are  not  always 
in  harmony. 

The  effect  of  expressive  labor  in  Chicago 
was  noticeable  to  me  everywhere.  In  the 
University,  in  the  newspapers,  in  the  social 
settlements,  in  the  public  charities,  in  the 
newest  kind  of  politician,  a  relative  sympathy 
for  the  man  who  works  with  his  hands  is  in 
one  way  very  apparent. 

Take  any  Chicago  personage  of  importance, 
whatever  his  profession  or  his  position,  and 
somehow  or  other  he  has  been  influenced  by 
the  spirit  of  the  intellectual  proletariat.  One 
of  the  younger  deans  of  the  University  is  the 
most  complete  anarchist  of  my  acquaintance. 

[211] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

"Sociology,"  in  all  its  branches,  is  the  great 
subject  of  the  place.  Young  literary  men 
like  Herrick  and  Friedman  dwell  with  in- 
sistent sympathy  upon  the  emotional  and 
aesthetic  demands  of  the  "people."  An  im- 
portant young  banker  is  an  emotional  socialist. 
A  young  newspaper  man  with  strong  "capi- 
talistic" backing  and  tradition  was  put  into 
an  important  office  in  the  city  hall  by  the  won- 
derfully broad  and  democratic  Mayor:  this 
young  man  resigned,  to  follow  out  the  cause 
of  socialism,  to  which  faith  he  had  come  dur- 
ing his  term  in  office. 

An  important  lawyer  and  politician  of  the 
city  is  Clarence  Darrow,  a  man  who  in  his 
practical  activity  and  his  literary  work,  has 
been  very  deeply  influenced  by  the  implicit 
ideas  of  the  working  class.  He  is  radical, 
idealistic  and  practical  at  once  and  because 
of  his  interest  in  human  psychology  and  in  the 
idealistic  future  often  appears  as  a  crank  or 
worse.  He  is  inconsistent  with  the  incon- 
sistency of  the  struggling,  unclear  proletariat 
whose  ideas  and  impulses  he  sympathetically 
grasps. 

Even    the    kid    glove    reformers    (Anton 
would   call   them  "The   Lily  Whites")    are 

[212] 


Chicago  Spirit  and  Its  Cause, 

more  cognizant  of  what  is  going  on  below 
than  they  are  in  the  East.  A  Chicago  re- 
former is  a  real,  plain  man.  William  Kent 
is  the  ideal  reformer  of  the  capitalist  class: 
practical,  radical,  conservative,  humorous, 
whose  honesty  is  so  thorough-going  that  it 
sticks  out  with  inspiring  positiveness  in  every- 
thing he  does  and  says.  About  him  is  some- 
thing of  the  down-rightness  and  plainness  of 
the  man-in-the-street. 

Perhaps  the  most  remarkable  illustration  of 
the  power  and  influence  of  the  proletariat 
in  the  big  western  metropolis  is  given  by  the 
personality  and  the  work  of  Miss  Jane  Ad- 
dams,  who,  in  Hull  House,  has  formed  a  kind 
of  salon,  an  exchange  of  ideas,  where  all  the 
surging  social  conceptions  find  expression. 

The  salons  of  history  were  limited.  The 
ideas  of  the  laboring  classes  hardly  found  an 
expression  in  them.  Philosophers  thought  for 
the  crowd,  who  were  out  of  sight  and  un- 
known. The  fact  that  the  most  democratic 
exchange  of  ideas  which  has  ever  attained 
respectability  centres  about  the  personality 
of  a  Chicago  woman,  is  not  an  accident.  I 
doubt  if  Jane  Addams  could  have  been 
evolved  anywhere  else  in  the  world. 
[213] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

She  has  been  an  important  factor  in  putting 
the  different  social  classes  in  touch  one  with 
another.  She  can  do  emotional  justice  all 
around.  She  understands  the  troubles  of  the 
rich  as  well  as  of  the  poor.  Her  instinctively 
psychological  insight  gives  her  sympathy  even 
with  the  morally  outcast.  Wonderful,  in- 
deed, is  her  emotional  tact.  She  is  curiously 
and  delightfully  free  of  sentimentality.  It  is 
as  a  rule  difficult  to  talk  of  oppression  and 
moral  degradation  without  a  show  of  indig- 
nation. But  she  carefully  refrains  from  any 
snap-shot  moral  judgment.  She  is  not,  in  the 
banal  sense,  a  "reformer,"  or  a  worker.  Her 
great  function  is  social:  she  has  established, 
like  the  French  women  of  the  eighteenth 
and  early  nineteenth  centuries,  a  salon  of  a 
high  order;  here  is  established  an  atmosphere 
where  ideas  of  importance  derived  from  the 
interests  and  passions  of  many  different  men 
and  many  different  sections  of  societv  are  ex- 
changed. 

In  her  I  felt  only  one  interest — in  the  hu- 
man being  who  had  something  serious  to  do 
or  say — a  never-ceasing  helpfulness  to  all  who 
want  to  work  or  live  seriously,  and  therefore 
at  present  a  great  liking  for  the  laboring 
[214] 


Chicago  Spirit  and  Its  Cause. 

class.  "I  am  interested  in  trades-unionism," 
she  said  to  me,  "because  it  is  the  only  thing 
which  to-day  seems  to  have  any  religion 
in  it." 

Another  remarkable  woman  in  this  city  is 
less  of  a  public  character  than  Miss  Addams, 
and  I  shall  therefore  not  give  her  name.  But 
she  is  a  woman  who  on  occasions  has  exerted 
a  strong  influence  in  Chicago.  She  has  an 
adventurous  and  investigating  turn  of  mind. 
She  likes  to  explore  life  and  to  delve  into  the 
interesting  personalities  of  the  town.  It  was 
she  who  acted  as  a  wedge  in  settling  the  great 
butchers'  strike,  and  who  discovered  the  hor- 
rible state  of  things  in  the  stock-yards;  the 
knowledge  of  which  was  wielded  by  her  and 
others  as  a  club  to  force  the  packers  to  send 
away  the  disreputable  strike-breakers. 

She  makes  her  own  living  in  one  of  the  pro- 
fessions. She  is  clever  in  her  work,  but  she 
does  not  like  it.  She  does  it  from  necessity 
and  grudges  every  moment  that  she  devotes 
to  it.  It  takes  away  from  her  real  interests. 
It  takes  away  from  the  amount  of  time  she 
can  give  to  the  strangely  keen  pleasure  of 
"getting  next"  to  the  character,  passions  and 
purposes  of  others. 

[215] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

She  is  as  much  interested  in  the  outcast  and 
the  thief  as  she  is  in  the  pillar  of  society  and 
the  reformer.  But  she  is  particularly  inter- 
ested in  the  laboring  man  and  his  destiny. 
"These  men,"  she  said  to  me,  "are  fine  fel- 
lows, but  they  all  need  elbows."  She  is  the 
elbow,  not  only  of  the  labor  leader,  but  of  the 
town  in  general.  She  tried  to  work  on  Shea, 
at  the  time  of  the  teamsters'  strike,  with  as 
much  calmness  of  mind  as  on  the  good  Mayor. 
With  the  latter,  of  course,  she  succeeded  bet- 
ter, and  has  been  influential  in  the  adminis- 
tration. A  member  of  the  remarkable  school 
board,  she  has  worked  consistently  on  almost 
ultra  democratic  lines.  Nothing  interests  her 
as  much  as  "the  people."  And  about  them 
she  is  curiously  imaginative. 

Her  woman's  susceptibility  to  emotional 
democracy  may  be  due  in  part  to  the  circum- 
stances of  her  childhood.  Exposure  and  pri- 
vation, intimate  personal  contact  with  hard- 
ship and  mere  humanity  probably  rendered 
her  more  impressionable  to  the  ideas  of  a  class 
to  which  she,  in  fact,  does  not  belong.  She 
is  capable  of  a  great  usefulness — as  a  stimu- 
lant, as  an  expresser — and  the  ideas  she  ex- 
presses are  curiously  dependent  on  the  in- 
[216] 


Chicago  Spirit  and  Its  Cause. 

stinctive  ideas  and  emotions  of  the  proletariat. 

One  of  the  most  vigorous  and  influential 
persons  in  the  city  is  a  woman  who  has  made 
herself  into  a  labor  leader,  has  organized  the 
teachers.  She  has  been  a  great  factor  in  the 
political  and  economic  life  of  Chicago.  She 
carries  to  excess  the  virtues  and  perhaps  the 
faults  of  the  belligerent  labor  leader — is  ter- 
ribly "class  conscious,"  as  Anton  would  say. 
But  she  derives  her  power  from  the  remark- 
ably widespread  influence  of  the  ideas  of  la- 
bor— of  the  ideas  which  come  from  below. 

The  strongest  feuilletonist,  logically  the 
ablest  editorial  writer  in  America,  is  Louis 
Post,  a  Chicago  editor.  He  is  also  one  of 
the  most  "radical"  men  in  the  country.  I 
heard  him  denounce,  with  passion,  in  a  ring- 
ing public  speech.  Judge  Holdom's  sweeping 
decision  giving  almost  unlimited  power  to  the 
employers,  through  injunctions  making  or- 
ganized labor  practically  illegal.  He  ap- 
pealed to  the  workingmen  to  go  to  the  ballot, 
to  rid  themselves  of  such  utter  injustice. 
"Such  tyranny,"  he  said,  "can  only  be  opposed 
with  bullets  or  ballots.  In  this  country,  we 
have  the  opportunity  to  resort  to  ballots."  In 
the  East,  they  would  call  this  cultivated,  good 
[217] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

and  able  man  an  "agitator."  But  the  senti- 
ment of  the  laborer  is  mighty  enough  in  Chi- 
cago to  estabish  an  atmosphere  in  which  men 
like  Post  occupy  a  respectable,  almost  a  con- 
servative position.  On  the  same  platform, 
the  same  day,  Anton  spoke,  and  showed  no 
more  indignation  than  Mr.  Post,  although  he 
said:  "This  judicial  decision  cannot  be 
obeyed  by  the  workingmen  of  this  city." 

While  in  Chicago,  I  had  the  pleasure  of  at- 
tending the  meetings  of  the-  "Lunch  Club," 
composed  of  men  of  the  best  character  and 
with  the  deepest  interest  in  "civic"  affairs. 
An  important  settlement  worker,  a  leading 
Socialist  editor,  a  banker  with  Socialistic  tend- 
encies, the  prominent  lawyer,  politician  and 
author  I  have  referred  to,  a  young  and  sound 
lawyer,  one  of  the  most  gifted  of  the  Western 
novelists,  a  newspaper  man  of  high  standing, 
a  progressive  priest,  the  young  commission- 
er of  Public  Works,  these  were  some  of  the 
members.  The  talk  was  always  about  some 
matter  of  public  concern  and  the  general 
ideas  resulting  from  such  consideration.  In 
the  tone  of  the  most  conservative  of  these  men 
of  good  position,  and  some  of  them  of  inde- 
pendent means,  there  was  a  marked  "radical- 
[218] 


Chicago  Spirit  and  Its  Cause. 

ism,"  a  markedly  emotional  interest  in  the  peo- 
ple^ an  inspiring  sentiment  of  democracy. 

Wherever  I  went  in  Chicago,  and  I  went 
everywhere,  the  ideas  I  heard  expressed  were 
preponderantly  "democratic,"  preponderantly 
on  subjects  vaguely  called  "sociological";  ex- 
pressed with  energy  and  often  with  distinc- 
tion. For  several  months  after  my  arrival  in 
Chicago  I  saw  these  "leading"  people  mainly: 
it  was  before  I  had  become  well  acquainted 
with  the  laboring  people  themselves.  When, 
however,  I  had  met  Anton  and  his  friends, 
whom  I  have  yet  to  describe,  I  felt  myself 
to  be  in  the  presence  of  the  source  of  the 
ideas  in  which  my  cultivated  friends  were  so 
much  interested.  It  seemed  that  the  ideas 
and  feelings  most  prevalent  in  Chicago's  in- 
tellectual and  serious  circles  began  with  the 
laboring  class,  and  were  expressed  best  by  the 
intellectual  proletariat.  Moreover,  I  found 
that  in  this  class,  where  these  feelings  and 
ideas  originated,  the  expression  of  them  was 
more  direct  and  warmer;  if  less  logical  and 
balanced,  it  was  more  real,  so  real  that  it 
was  fascinating.  At  this  point,  therefore,  be- 
gins my  direct  observations  of  Anton  and  his 
friends. 

[219] 


CHAPTER  XI. 

Social  Amenities. 

A  LITTLE  while  after  our  meeting,  Anton  in- 
vited me  to  a  Sunday  noon-day  dinner  at  his 
house  on  the  West  Side — the  first  of  a  long 
series  of  visits.  There  I  met  Maggie  and  the 
three  children.  I  found  a  house  perfectly 
clean,  a  garden  well-cultivated,  the  children 
healthy  and  well-cared  for,  a  well-cooked  din- 
ner, and  Maggie,  the  spirit  of  it  all,  without 
assistance,  and  yet  pretty,  young-looking  and 
cheerful.  She  took  intelligent  part  in  the 
conversation  at  the  table.  The  talk  was  frank 
and  full,  and  dealt  with  the  facts  of  the  team- 
sters' strike  and  with  labor  and  social  matters 
generally.  I  was  deeply  struck  with  the  vi- 
tality and  charm  of  the  entire  family.  I  had 
naturally  enough  at  that  time,  due  to  my  lack 
of  experience  in  this  direction,  a  feeling  that 
the  conventional  education  of  college  and  of 
well-to-do  conditions  generally  puts  a  wide 
intellectual  difference  between  the  so-called 

[220] 


Social  Amenities. 

educated  man  and  the  vigorous  man  of  the 
people  who  learns  from  experience  and  ob- 
servation. But  I  was  soon  to  find  myself  so 
absorbed  by  my  experiences  with  this  family 
and  their  friends  that  it  is  now  a  common- 
place thought  with  me  that  "culture"  has 
many  paths  by  which  it  is  reached,  and  that 
it  is  only  the  extraordinary  person  who  attains 
it  at  all.  Certainly  many  of  the  American 
mechanics  possess  this  quality  in  its  essence  to 
as  great  a  degree,  at  least,  as  the  man  of  so- 
called  education,  though  these  mechanics  do 
not  often  think  so.  They  are  overpowered 
with  an  often  baseless  sense  of  inferiority. 

"Education,"  said  Maggie,  regretfully, 
"helps  you  to  know  anybody  you  want  to." 
This  was  a  true  word,  and  shows  where  the 
real  limitation  is — social. 

Maggie  and  Anton  and  their  trades-union 
and  radical  friends,  although  they  feel  the  so- 
cial injustice,  are  not  under  the  illusion  that 
people  who  are  educated  are  necessarily  think- 
ers or  in  any  way  really  superior  to  them- 
selves. I  heard  Anton,  in  one  of  his  speeches 
before  the  Social  Science  League,  say: 

"I  don't  know  that  people  who  are  profes- 
sional thinkers  or  philosophers  or  students  do 
[221] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

all  the  thinking;  perhaps  other  people  who 
are  at  work  have  an  opportunity  to  think  that 
the  other  fellows  have  not  got." 

Anton,  when  tired  by  the  routine  of  the  shop 
and  of  the  trades-union  activities,  goes  to  the 
"radicals,"  and  by  the  more  free  and  subtle 
among  them  is  refreshed  and  encouraged. 
One  night  he  and  I  talked  till  midnight  with 
an  aesthetic  person  about  literature  and  art. 
On  account  of  Anton's  lack  of  specific  educa- 
tion our  facility  in  shades  of  expression  was 
impressive  to  him,  but  not  at  all  discouraging, 
and  it  did  not  need  to  be ;  for  when  there  was 
a  connecting  point,  his  ideas  came  rich  and 
red  in  response.  He  seemed  to  me  much 
nearer  to  reality  than  my  learned  friend  or  I, 
and  so  in  a  better  position  to  think,  if,  after 
the  day's  work,  he  had  enough  energy  left 
over. 

Some  of  the  women  of  Chicago  have  "taken 
Anton  up,"  but  they  are  sometimes  shocked 
by  his  frankness,  and  as  his  nature  is  really  a 
sweet  and  humane  one,  the  sensibilities  of  the 
women  do  not  seem  too  well  founded. 

"The  women  object  to  my  language,"  he 
said.  "They  object  to  my  saying  damn  and 
hell.  They  claim  to  be  interested  in  the 
[222] 


i 


Social  Amenities. 

trades-union  movement,  and  yet  they  often 
stick  on  little  things.  How  can  they  expect 
to  have  the  workingman  use  any  language  but 
his  own?  Why,  for  such  a  trivial  thing,  do 
they  criticize?  Why  not  get  out  and  hustle 
for  a  cause  they  claim  to  be  right  and  forget 
to  be  finnicky?  It  is  the  same  way  with  some 
of  the  'gentlemen.'  If  they  find  the  work- 
ingman has  some  bad  habits,  if  he  is  rough  and 
not  refined,  or  if  he  is  sometimes  unscrupulous 
about  money,  they  lose  their  interest  in  the 
cause.  But  the  cause  is  just  as  important,  in 
spite  of  these  things,  perhaps  more  important 
because  of  them. 

"One  time,  at  a  ^radical'  meeting,  a  lady 
was  shocked  at  my  language,  and  said: 
'Now,  Mr.  Anton,  you  would  be  good  for  the 
cause  if  you  did  not  say  such  words ;  you  say 
damn,  you  say  hell.'  The  truth  is,  I  like  to 
shock  these  anarchists,  free-lovers,  anthropol- 
ogists, mystics  and  cranks  who  gather  at  these 
'radical'  meetings.  Some  of  them  are  sensi- 
ble and  thoughtful,  but  most  of  them  are  aw- 
ful faddists. 

"At  this  meeting  I  thought  I  would  be  an 
irritant,  a  part  I  often  played  in  these  meet- 
ings. In  the  labor  meetings  I  am  serious.  I 
[223] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

am  a  tyrant  there  and  try  to  accomplish 
things.  But  in  the  radical  meetings  I  enjoy 
myself  and  try  to  stir  people  up.  On  this  oc- 
casion, I  defended  cigarette  smoking  against 
the  speaker  of  the  evening,  and  also  attacked 
the  Church.  He  said  that  cigarettes  had  a 
tendency  to  confuse  the  mind  and  destroy  the 
morals. 

I  got  up  and  protested  in  the  name  of 
humanity  and  decency  against  Mr.  Sercombe 
putting  together  in  his  argument  the  cheap 
politician.  Carter  Harrison,  and  the  great 
philosopher,  Tom  Paine,  both  of  whom  he 
quoted  as  against  cigarettes.  I  also  re- 
marked that  it  was  singular  Mr.  Sercombe 
should  have  &o  great  a  horror  of  cigarettes  and 
at  the  same  time  so  great  an  admiration  for 
Clarence  Darrow,  who  was  a  cigarette  fiend. 
Under  another  heading,  I  remarked  that  re- 
ligion was  tyrannical;  as  it  was  preached  in 
the  pulpit,  it  was  the  author  of  vice,  crime  and 
vulgarity,  and  that  Christ  was  responsible. 
This  was  an  extreme  statement,  and  I  made  it 
only  to  irritate  the  anthropologists.  As  they 
were  studying  Man,  I  thought  I  would  give 
them  one  to  study.  A  lady  got  up,  red  with 
horror,  and  said:  'I  respect  the  rules  of  this 
[224] 


Social  Amenities. 

society,  so  I  refrain  from  answering  one  of  the 
critics,'  meaning  me. 

"The  next  Sunday  I  seized  an  opportunity 
in  the  meeting  of  the  Anthropological  Society 
to  say  that  I  also  respected  the  rules  of  the 
society,  provided  they  did  not  come  in  contact 
with  my  psychology  and  individuality.  'In 
that  case,'  I  said,  'while  some  may  prefer 
others,  I  prefer  myself.'  In  that  society  they 
always  hold  their  breath  when  I  get  up  to 
speak.  They  don't  know  what  I  am  going  to 
say  next. 

"The  same  lady  who  objected,  said,  at  an- 
other meeting:  *I  am  very  much  pleased  to 
be  able  to  get  up  to  speak  in  behalf  of  the 
workers.  It  pleases  me  very  much  to  say  that 
I,  in  my  youth,  was  a  hard-working  girl,  and 
ever  since  I  met  my  beloved  and  was  married 
by  the  laws  of  God  I  have  given  much  atten- 
tion to  workers  in  and  out  of  Unions ;  I  have 
felt  that  the  poor  non-union  man  who  is  cut 
off  from  society  needs  more  consideration 
even  than  an  ordinary  criminal.' 

"I  got  up  at  this  point  and  said:  'Mr. 
Chairman,  for  Christ* s  sake  how  long  have 
we  got  to  listen  to  this  stuff?' 

"Even  a  freak  can  speak  before  this  society 
[225] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

or  before  the  Social  Science  League.  In  both 
these  societies  they  have  some  good  speakers, 
and  the  purpose  of  the  gathering  is  a  good 
one,  namely,  the  education  of  the  workers  to 
a  sense  of  their  rights ;  but  the  trouble  is  few 
workers  go  there,  while  the  chairs  are  taken 
by  a  lot  of  long-haired  cranks  instead.  I 
liked  to  put  them  to  a  test  to  see  how  much 
they  believed  in  free  speech,  which  they  were 
always  shouting  about.  Maggie,  being  a 
woman,  is  softer  than  I,  and  didn't  like  the 
way  I  swore  and  talked  in  the  meetings.  So 
she  put  them  next  to  the  reason  I  did  it,  just 
to  get  a  'rise,'  and  after  that  they  took  me  more 
coolly. 

"But  I  could  always  get  a  'rise'  out  of  the 
lady  I  have  spoken  of.  One  night  a  wood- 
worker, a  friend  of  mine  and  an  anarchist  of 
the  thoughtful  kind  who  have  read  and  who 
do  not  talk  nonsense,  made  a  speech  before 
the  Social  Science  League,  in  which  he  tried 
to  show  that  many  great  men  of  the  past  and 
many  cultivated  men  to-day  have  been,  and 
are,  imbued  with  anarchistic  ideas.  The  lady 
was  tickled  to  death  that  the  speaker  could 
define  anarchism  in  such  a  way  as  to  make  it 
seem  nice  and  respectable,  and  so  she  said: 
[226] 


Social  Amenities. 

*I  am  very  glad  to-night  to  say  to  you  that  I 
also  have  been  an  anarchist  unconsciously.  I 
accept  anarchism,  if  so  defined,  and  I  thank 
God  for  it.' 

"That  gave  me  my  opportunity.  I  got  up, 
and  said:  'I  have  met  many  men  and  women 
who  have  blasphemed  the  Deity,  but  I  never 
until  to-night  met  anybody  willing  to  undergo 
the  responsibility  of  thanking  God  for  creat- 
ing anarchists.  If  anarchism  is  what  it  is, 
and  if  there  are  any  people  who  have  become 
anarchists,  God  is  the  last  man  who  is  entitled 
to  any  credit  for  it.  I  for  one  would  prefer 
to  give  the  credit  to  the  devil,  who  has  done 
some  things  that  are  good.' 

"She  thought  that  was  awful.  She  and  the 
others  think  they  understand  poetry,  society 
and  philosophy.  Why  can't  they  understand 
me?    Why  get  angry?" 

Anton  goes  everywhere  in  his  flannel  shirt. 
He  presides  at  his  own  table  in  one,  goes 
to  the  meetings  in  one,  and  takes  pride  in  it 
as  a  symbol  of  his  class.  He  is  most  at  home 
with  his  coat  off,  a  suspender  strap  around  his 
robust  body,  no  necktie,  and  on  the  point  of 
hurling  some  bomb-like  words  at  an  opponent. 
On  the  subject  of  dress,  he  said: 
[227] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

"I  acquired  a  bad  habit  when  I  was  a  hobo 
— the  desire  to  dress  well.  At  that  time  I  was 
obligated,  for  I  had  to  make  the  best  appear- 
ance, or  I  would  not  have  been  able  to  beg  or 
get  a  job.  But  now  it  is  different.  I  am  in- 
dependent and  don't  need  to  dress.  I  am  in- 
dependent of  all  but  my  employer.  If  he 
wanted  me  to  wear  a  tie  in  the  shop,  I  prob- 
ably would.  Capitalists  and  clerks  have  to 
dress  for  business  reasons,  but  I  don't  have  to. 
All  really  civilized  people  from  Tolstoi  to 
Wagner  believe  in  the  Simple  Life.  I  al- 
ways preside  over  the  Union  meetings  in  a 
blue  flannel  shirt." 

Anton  likes  his  joke,  and  has  his  moments 
of  workingman's  downright  lightness.  He 
added,  on  this  occasion:  "You  made  a  great 
impression  on  Maggie,  the  other  evening, 
when  I  had  gone  out,  but  you  wore  a  flannel 
shirt." 

At  these  "radical"  gatherings  there  are 
many  free-lovers,  and  anti-free-lovers,  and 
they  often  take  one  another  by  the  hair,  fig- 
uratively speaking. 

"Some  of  these  women,"  said  Anton,  "liked 
me.  They  thought  I  was  handsome,  vigor- 
ous and  had  nice  ways,  but  they  wondered 
[228] 


Social  Amenities. 

why  I  swore.  I  promised  them  to  give  a  rea- 
son some  time.  My  opportunity  came  once 
when  a  woman  spoke  on  license  versus  lib- 
erty. I  got  up,  after  her  speech,  and  said 
some  of  my  friends  had  corrected  me  on  vari- 
ous occasions  about  using  profanity.  I  did 
so,  I  said,  in  order  to  please  both  my  ultra 
radical  friends  and  also  my  ultra  conservative 
friends.  I  had  been  raised,  I  said,  more  than 
a  Christian,  but  had  been  surrounded  by  infi- 
dels, that  I  had  a  marriage  certificate,  but  a 
free-love  inclination ;  I  therefore  knew  that  if 
I  conducted  myself  in  the  conventional  man- 
ner and  did  not  swear,  that  all  the  goody- 
goody  women  would  fall  completely  in  love 
with  me;  and,  as  my  capacity  was  limited,  I 
could  best  introduce  moderation  in  their 
hearts  by  using  profanity  and  thus  checking 
them." 

Anton,  in  spite  of  the  joking  tone  of  the 
above,  is  in  reality  very  attractive  to  women. 
His  temperament,  energy,  idealistic  vehe- 
mence, and  even  his  rough  sincerity,  appeal  to 
them.  I  had  opportunity  to  see  how  many 
of  the  "radical"  women  pursued  him.  He 
was  not  too  offish,  and  would  sometimes  yield 
gracefully,  but  Maggie,  who  knew  everything, 
[229] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

always  knew  that  she  had  the  best  of  Anton's 
heart,  mind  and  temperament  So  she  for- 
gave not  only  the  trades-union  activity  that 
took  him  from  home  at  night,  but  even  his  in- 
terest in  other  women. 

"I  told  her  nothing  at  first,"  said  Anton, 
"but  I  learned  better,  and  when  I  told  her 
everything,  she  had  become  more  radical,  and 
she  understood  better  and  did  not  mind  when 
I  was  out.  At  a  later  time  she  went  further 
than  I  did  in  radical  theory,  but  her  natural, 
womanly  conservatism  and  our  frankness  to- 
gether kept  her  from  putting  her  ideas  into 
practice.  Once  she  asked  me  if  she  ought  not 
to  make  an  experiment.  She  had  been  hear- 
ing so  much  free-love  talk  that  she  began  to 
feel  that  she  was  out-of-date.  I  told  her  she 
was  a  fool  to  do  anything  she  did  not  want  to 
do,  just  because  of  a  lousy  theory  that  was  go- 
ing the  rounds.     So  she  didn't. 

''Maggie  used  to  wonder  why  I  did  not  no- 
tice this  and  that,  why  I  did  not  pay  her  little 
attentions  and  talk  polite  to  her.  But  I  leave 
that  for  conservative  men  who  stay  at  home. 
I  talk  to  her,  instead,  and  she  likes  it." 

Maggie  was  there,  as  Anton  and  I  talked, 
and  she  said,  at  this  point: 
• [230] 


Social  Amenities. 

"If  I  have  to  marry  again,  I  don't  know 
where  I  can  find  another  like  you;  and  I 
couldn't  stand  a  home  man." 

"She  is  a  wise  woman,"  said  Anton,  "and 
she  knows  the  best  way  of  managing  a  restless 
fellow  like  me.  The  other  night  I  had  been 
to  a  Union  meeting  and  something  came  up 
about  policy  I  wanted  to  talk  over  with  Mag- 
gie. That  evening  I  dined  in  town,  and 
[Julia,  one  of  the  free-love  ladies  who  are 
prominent  at  the  radical  meetings,  wanted  me 
to  take  her  to  hear  a  Pentecost  lecture.  When 
I  told  her  I  had  an  engagement  with  Maggie, 
she  sneered,  and  said:  'You  are  a  slave  to 
your  wife.  You  only  pretend  to  be  a  free- 
lover.'  *I  am  not  a  slave  to  you,  anyway,'  I 
said,  and  I  went  home. 

"This  lady,  whom  I  call  Julia,  has  quite 
an  important  position  among  some  of  the  rad- 
icals. She  is  not  pretty — you  have  seen  her, 
and  you  know — and  she  is  not  original  or 
amusing.  It  is  by  virtue  of  her  free-love  that 
she  gets  her  position.  That  is  an  easy  graft 
with  some  of  these  people.  For  instance,  a 
young  machinist  asked  me  one  day  to  take 
him  to  a  free-love  meeting.  He  is  a  regular 
buck,  and  I  knew  that  he  did  not  care  about 
[231] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

the  principles  of  freedom.  It  was  license  he 
wanted.  So  I  said  to  him :  *I  don't  want  to 
force  potatoes  on  people  who  want  oranges.'  " 

I  saw  "Julia"  several  times,  and  found  her 
very  serious  and  much  interested,  though  in 
an  unillumined  way,  in  all  social  problems, 
and  particularly  in  everything  that  touched 
upon  the  welfare  of  the  working  class,  to 
which  she  belonged.  She  worked  in  the  fac- 
tory, and  in  the  evenings  improved  her  mind 
by  going  to  the  radical  meetings  and  listen- 
ing to  the  lectures.  Her  "free-love"  was  part- 
ly induced,  no  doubt,  by  her  temperament,  but 
it  was  also  influenced  by  the  general  "spirit 
of  protest"  against  all  capitalistic  institutions, 
including  marriage.  She  was  not  at  all  se- 
ductive, but  she  took  herself  so  seriously,  and 
was  taken  so  seriously  by  the  people  with 
whom  she  associated,  that  she  seemed  a  person 
of  the  utmost  respectability. 

"I  was  conservative,"  said  Anton,  "for  a 
long  time  about  sex.  These  ladies  used  to 
get  mad  at  me  on  that  question.  But  no  mat- 
ter how  conservative  I  was,  what. I  said  was  no 
more  ridiculous  than  what  they  said.  I  be- 
gan to  feel  more  broad  and  tolerant  on  this 
subject  after  I  came  to  know  Isaac  and  his 
[232] 


Social  Amenities. 

wife  and  family  well.  Maggie  and  I  found 
these  people  so  refined  and  gentle  and  good 
that  we  came  to  be  tolerant  to  their  theories 
of  anarchy  and  free-love.  They  were  wild 
about  children,  and  that  went  straight  to  Mag- 
gie's heart." 

"They  talked,"  said  Maggie,  "so  frankly 
and  so  sweetly  about  things  I  thought  ought 
not  to  be  talked  about  that  I  got  to  feel  they 
and  their  ways  of  seeing  things  were  right,  at 
least  in  part." 

When  one  takes  into  account  the  narrow- 
ness of  the  ordinary  laborer's  life;  how  lack- 
ing in  it  are  the  elements  of  "sweetness  and 
light"  in  the  intellectual  sense,  one  cannot 
wonder  at  .the  eagerness  with  which  the  more 
energetic  among  them  grasp  at  any  opportu- 
nity to  broaden  their  mental  horizon.  Their 
method  of  thinking  often  seems  crude  and 
anti-social,  and  yet  even  the  extreme  anarchis- 
tic activities  are  educating  and  refining  in 
their  influence.  Certainly  one  has  abundant 
opportunity  of  observing  that  those  laborers 
who  have  come  under  Socialistic  or  anarchis- 
tic influences  are  much  more  "civilized,"  more 
interesting,  more  alive  and  progressive,  than 
those  who  live  exclusively  the  routine  and  un- 
[233] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

stimulating  life  of  the  wage-worker.  Who 
can  wonder  at  the  fact  that  the  need  of  excite- 
ment, if  nothing  else,  forces  many  of  these 
men  and  women  to  adopt  ways  of  feeling  and 
thinking  which  are  not  without  danger  to  the 
present  organization  of  society? 


[234] 


CHAPTER  XII. 

Argument  With  Boss. 

The  agreement  between  the  Woodwork- 
ers' District  Council  and  the  planing  mill 
operators  of  Chicago  expired  in  February, 
1905.  Anton  was  at  the  time  President  of 
the  Council,  and  in  the  negotiations  tending 
towards  a  new  agreement  which  ensued,  he 
took  a  leading  part.  The  general  method  of 
procedure  on  the  part  of  the  men  was  for  a 
committee  to  draw  up  an  agreement,  present 
it  for  approval  to  the  Council,  and  then  refer 
it  to  the  referendum  for  the  approval  of  the 
rank  and  file;  and  it  would  then  go  to  the 
employers.  On  this  occasion  no  demand  for 
increase  of  wages  was  made,  except  in  the  case 
of  one  shop,  where  the  wages  were  lower  than 
in  the  others.  A  continuance  of  the  closed 
shop  agreement,  which  had  been  in  force,  was 
insisted  upon  by  the  men,  while  the  employers 
made  a  stand  for  the  "open  shop,"  which  at 
that  time  was  "epidemic"  among  them. 
[235] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

In  previous  years  the  men's  committee  se- 
lected to  present  the  agreement  to  the  employ- 
ers consisted  of  the  board  of  business  agents, 
four  salaried  men;  but  as  the  employers'  or- 
ganizations became  more  general,  the  employ- 
ers in  many  instances  complained  that  the 
board  of  business  agents  did  not  represent  the 
wishes  of  the  rank  and  file.  So  of  late  the 
policy  has  been  for  a  committee  of  five  men, 
w^orking  at  their  trade,  to  accompany  the  busi- 
ness agents  in  the  negotiations  v^ith  the  em- 
ployers. •_ 

On  this  occasion,  however,  as  it  was  known 
that  the  men  "stood  pat"  for  the  closed  shop, 
the  first  meeting  with  the  employers  was  held 
by  the  business  agents  alone.  "The  bosses' 
chairman,"  said  Anton,  "wanted  to  know  im- 
mediately why  the  rank  and  file  was  not  rep- 
resented. He  was  sure  that  the  open  shop 
idea  would  meet  with  the  approval  of  the 
men. 

The  business  agents  reported  the  matter  to 
the  Coiincil,  and  a  committee  of  five  men, 
working  at  the  trade,  was  appointed.  This 
committee,  on  its  return  from  the  meeting 
with  the  bosses,  recommended  to  the  Council 
a  compromise,  but  the  Council  "sat  on"  the 


Argument  With  Boss. 

committee  and  "stood  pat"  for  the  closed 
shop. 

"I  was  not  on  that  first  committee,"  Anton 
said,  "and  I  severely  criticized  them  for  their 
timidity.  One  of  the  committee  resigned,  and 
I  was  put  in  his  place.  In  the  committee 
meeting,  before  we  went  to  the  bosses,  they 
made  me  spokesman,  and  I  laid  the  law  down. 
A  business  agent  tried  to  tell  me  what  to  say, 
but  I  cut  him  short,  and  said  that  I  would 
accept  the  responsibility  of  my  own  words,  but 
would  not  use  his. 

"When  we  got  before  the  employers'  com- 
mittee, I  began  my  remarks  by  saying  that 
we  had  no  authority  to  enter  into  a  final  agree- 
ment without  referring  the  matter  to  the  or- 
ganization, but  that  the  men  stood  for  the 
closed  shop ;  we  felt  it  was  reasonable  in  itself, 
and  that  to  change  it  at  this  late  day,  after  it 
had  been  in  force  for  several  years,  was  un- 
reasonable. I  quoted  two  recent  court  deci- 
sions sustaining  the  legality  of  the  closed 
shop. 

"The  Chairman  for  the  bosses  replied,  said 

that  if  the  agreement  must  be  referred  back 

to  the  Union,  they  could  accomplish  nothing; 

he  insisted  that  the  closed  shop  was  illegal, 

[237] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

and  that  the  employers  might  have  damage 
suits  on  their  hands,  and  he  laid  stress  on  what 
he  called  the  moral  point  of  view:  said  the 
closed  shop  was  immoral.  In  answer,  I  said 
that  the  employers  were  responsible  for  tak- 
ing away  the  autocratic  power  of  the  business 
agent  in  making  agreements;  that  the  em- 
ployer, through  the  press,  had  continually 
fulminated  against  the  business  agent,  or,  as 
they  called  him,  the  walking  delegate,  whom 
they  claimed  would  do  as  he  pleased  without 
reference  to  the  wishes  of  the  rank  and  file  in 
bringing  about  a  settlement.  And  now  they 
inconsistently  objected  because  the  committee 
must  refer  to  the  organization.  In  regard  to 
the  alleged  illegality  of  the  closed  shop  agree- 
ment, I  showed  them  two  distinct  decisions 
rendered  about  the  closed  shop,  one  in  New 
York  and  one  in  England,  and  then  I  referred 
them  to  that  part  of  President  Roosevelt's 
message  to  Congress  where  he  says,  in  effect: 
'There  can  be  no  question  of  the  legality  of 
organized  workers  refusing  to  work  with  such 
men  as  are  not  members  of  the  Union.  This 
may  or  may  not  be  a  moral  right,  that  depends 
on  the  conditions  in  the  special  case.'  So  said 
the  President.  'I,  personally,'  I  added,  in 
[238] 


Argument  With  Boss. 

support  of  the  moral  right  of  the  closed  shop, 
'should  reasonably  be  the  judge  of  whom  I 
shall  work  with,  as  far  as  I  have  the  power. 
Will  you  deny  me  the  right  of  refusing  to 
work  with  an  anarchist  or  with  a  brute  negro, 
or  any  other  undesirable  character?'  I  chal- 
lenged them  to  show  one  instance  where  the 
law  compels  a  man  to  work  with  such  asso- 
ciates. I  pointed  out  many  cases  where  em- 
ployers had  discriminated  against  men  by  rea- 
son of  their  color:  porters  on  trains  are  all 
negroes,  section  men  in  some  parts  of  the  coun- 
try are  all  Chinamen.  No  man  questioned 
the  employer's  right  to  hire  whomsoever  he 
pleased  or  discriminate  against  anybody  he 
wanted  to. 

"  'I  assure  you,'  I  added,  *our  organization 
has  no  particular  objection  to  your  hiring  non- 
union men.  We  want  to  be  fair,  however, 
and  to  notify  you  in  time,  that  if  you  do  hire 
non-union  men,  you  cannot  hire  us.  To  us, 
non-union  men  are  undesirable  associates,  and 
we  will  not  work  with  them.' 

"The  bosses'  spokesman  interrupted  me  at 
this  point  and  said  he  would  waive  the  legal 
right,  but  asked  me  if  I  did  not  think  there 
was  a  moral  question  involved. 
[239] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

"  'Yes/  I  replied,  'there  is  a  moral  question 
involved.  I  quite  agree  to  that.  I  hope  you 
will  pardon  me  if  I  try  to  show  you  the  light. 
Ninety-nine  out  of  one  hundred  workingmen, 
when  talking  among  themselves,  are  favor- 
ably inclined  towards  Unionism.  But  they 
have  two  objections  to  joining  the  Union. 
One  is  the  fear  of  incurring  the  disfavor  of 
the  employer,  and  the  other  is  the  cost,  fifty 
cents  a  month  in  dues  and  sometimes  assess- 
ments which  may  not  directly  benefit  them. 
The  result  is  that,  after  a  fair  analysis,  the 
principal  objection  of  the  workingman  to  join- 
ing the  Union  is  founded  on  stupid  selfish- 
ness, ignorance  and  cowardice. 

"  'In  view  of  the  fact  that  human  beings  are 
more  susceptible  to  the  bad,  the  mean  and  the 
selfish  than  to  the  good  and  the  unselfish,  it  is, 
in  my  opinion,  decidedly  immoral  to  allow 
one  or  two  men  in  a  shop  to  lead  eighteen  or 
twenty  to  become  more  selfish  rather  than 
more  humane.  For  these  reasons  I  quite 
agree  that  there  is  a  moral  side  to  this  ques- 
tion, and  that,  morally,  the  trade-union,  and 
especially  the  closed  shop  idea,  have  been 
great  factors  for  human  good. 

"  'The  employers'  committee  have  appealed 
[240] 


Argument  With  Boss. 

to  my  sympathy.  Your  spokesman  has  asked 
me  to  defend  your  case.  This  is  an  admission 
of  weakness.  But  for  me  to  do  anything  on 
this  committee  except  to  reason  for  the  inter- 
est of  those  I  represent  would  be  satannical, 
and  I  would  not  be  worthy  the  respect  of  an 
honest  opponent.  I  am  thoroughly  convinced 
of  the  justice  of  our  case,  and  while  I  would 
not  like  to  see  a  strike,  I  feel  I  would  be  a 
coward  and  a  hypocrite  to  tell  you  that  I 
would  advise  the  rank  and  file  in  any  other 
direction.  I  believe  the  balance  of  this  com- 
mittee agrees  with  me,  but  if  they  were  all 
opposed,  I  would  still  go  before  the  rank  and 
file  in  their  mass  meeting  and  say,  like  Teddy, 
'Boys,  you  are  right;  stand  pat.' 

"I  addressed  my  remarks  to  the  spokesman, 
and  I  noticed  that,  while  I  corrected  him,  the 
other  bosses  had  a  smile  on  their  faces.  He 
was  too  much  of  a  self-appointer,  and  was  not 
popular.  The  meeting  adjourned,  and  the 
next  day  the  secretary  of  the  Lumber  Dealers' 
Association  came  to  the  office  of  the  Wood- 
workers and  wanted  to  know  where  that  young 
fellow,  Anton,  worked.  He  wanted  a  closed 
shop,  and  liked  what  I  had  said.  The  open 
shop  would  mean  more  bother  to  him.  He 
[241] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

told  me  in  confidence  that  my  argument  had 
met  with  the  approval  of  all  the  bosses,  except 
the  spokesman.  In  our  mass-meeting  on  Sun- 
day every  man  voted  in  favor  of  the  closed 
shop.  So  at  the  next  meeting  with  the  em- 
ployers, I  told  them  that  we  now  had  the 
power  to  act  definitely,  and  would  accept  the 
bosses'  signature  to  the  agreement  we  had 
drawn  up.  It  was  in  substance  an  ultimatum, 
and  they  agreed  to  our  terms,  the  closed  shop. 
"That  finished  that  discussion,  and  things 
had  been  settled  without  a  strike,  but  soon 
after  a  dispute  about  wages  arose  in  another 
branch  of  the  trade,  interior  trimmings.  We 
asked  for  an  increase  of  two  cents  an  hour  for 
all  the  men  employed,  instead  of  the  usual 
demand  to  raise  the  minimum  scale.  I  was 
spokesman  when  we  presented  our  request, 
and  the  bosses  nearly  fell  dead.  They  took 
three  hours  to  picture  their  poverty,  and  we 
came  to  no  understanding.  The  men,  at  a 
mass-meeting,  sustained  our  position,  and 
when  we  met  the  bosses  again  we  agreed  on  a 
compromise,  namely,  that  the  present  scale  of 
wages  should  continue  for  six  months,  at  the 
end  of  that  time  one  cent  an  hour  increase, 
and  another  cent  increase  at  the  beginning  of 
[242] 


Argument  With  Boss. 

the  second  year.  This  committee  recom- 
mended this  agreement  to  a  mass  meeting,  but 
the  men  rejected  it  with  considerable  criti- 
cism, as  it  concerned  only  the  minimum  scale 
and  did  not  apply  to  all  the  men.  One  old 
Scotchman  made  the  charge  that  the  commit- 
tee was  polluted. 

"So  we  had  to  report  to  the  bosses  that  the 
men  would  not  accept  the  compromise  agree- 
ment. Then  the  bosses  insinuated  that  it  had 
been  their  intention  of  giving  this  increase  all 
around,  instead  of  merely  applying  to  the 
minimum  scale.  That  was  a  lie,  and  it  made 
me  raving  mad.  I  got  up  before  the  com- 
mittee of  the  bosses  and  said:  *In  the  mass- 
meeting  our  committee  has  been  accused  of 
being  polluted,  and  here  the  bosses  accuse  us 
of  being  fools.  I  am  absolutely  certain  that 
the  bosses'  chairman  stated  most  emphatically 
that  they  would  not,  and  could  not,  make  the 
increase  apply  to  all  the  men.  Personally,  I 
feel  that  our  committee  should  now  stand  pat 
on  the  original  demand,  so  that  we  cannot  be 
misunderstood,  either  by  the  bosses  or  by  the 
rank  and  file.'  I  was  awfully  angry.  But 
the  chairman  of  the  employers  apologized, 
and  they  agreed  to  make  the  raise  apply  to  all 
[243] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

the  men.  This  we  submitted  to  the  mass- 
meeting,  but  without  recommending  it,  and  it 
was  carried  by  one  vote.  So  that  settled  that 
dispute. 

"There  was  one  member  of  our  committee 
who  had  an  ambition  to  be  a  walking  dele- 
gate. He  was  a  demagogue,  who  always  ap- 
pealed to  the  rank  and  file.  He  sat  in  the 
discussion  with  the  bosses  and  did  not  say  a 
word,  but  in  the  mass-meeting  he  got  up  and 
supported  the  demands  of  the  employers ;  but, 
when  he  saw  how  the  men  were  feeling,  he 
switched  around.  I  made  up  my  mind  to 
give  him  a  good  flaying,  and  in  the  next  Coun- 
cil meeting  I  showed  him  up,  balled  him  out 
for  fair,  showed  his  cowardice  for  a  whole 
half  hour.  That  killed  him  completely  in  the 
movement.  He  has  never  been  heard  of  since. 
In  the  Council  he  could  not  play  to  the  gal- 
leries, as  he  could  in  the  mass-meeting. 

*'The  next  negotiations  we  had  with  the  em- 
ployers led  to  a  strike,  which  we  lost.  It  was 
in  another  branch  of  the  trade,  the  bar  fixture 
workers.  Their  agreement  with  the  bosses 
expired  July  ist,  1905.  Their  committee  de- 
manded an  increase  of  ten  cents  an  hour  all 
around.  It  was  in  reality  a  stiff  thing  to  ask, 
[244] 


^Argument  With  Boss. 

as  in  other  cities  no  such  wages  were  given  as 
those  we  demanded,  and  the  bosses  maintained 
that,  if  they  gave  these  wages,  they  could  not 
compete.  But  the  men  were  in  a  peculiar 
frame  of  mind.  Two  years  before  that  time 
the  bosses  stood  pat  and  said  they  could  pay 
no  more  wages,  but  the  men,  after  being  on 
strike  ten  days,  gained  what  they  demanded. 
So  the  men  thought  the  present  attitude  of  the 
employers  was  also  a  bluff,  and  that  they  could 
turn  the  same  trick  again.  Some  of  the  lead- 
ers, of  course,  knew  better,  and  that  it  was 
foolish  to  strike  at  that  time;  and  many  of 
these  leaders  did  what  they  could  to  affect 
the  mood  of  the  men,  but  to  no  avail. 

"We  had  seven  meetings  with  the  employ- 
ers and  could  not  make  them  yield  an  inch, 
so  we  called  a  mass-meeting  of  the  men.  It 
was  jammed,  and  disorderly,  and  there  was  a 
large  majority  in  favor  of  a  strike.  So  the 
committee  returned  to  the  bosses,  and  I  said: 
'You  cannot  blame  the  rank  and  file  for  being 
sceptical  when  they  are  told  by  their  employ- 
ers that,  for  competitive  reasons,  wages  can- 
not be  raised.  This  is,  at  all  times,  the  con- 
tention of  the  employer,  and  his  manner  of  re- 
ply to  the  Union,  regardless  of  wages,  hours 
[245] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

or  conditions.  It  is  always  the  same  old 
story :  you  cannot  compete.  If  you  would  say 
this  only  at  times  when  it  was  true,  you  would 
find  the  men  ready  to  believe  you.  But  you 
always  say  it,  true  or  not.  You  are  like  the 
boy  that  yelled  wolf  too  often. 

"  'The  employer  in  Milwaukee,'  I  contin- 
ued, 'pay  twenty-five  cents  an  hour,  and  yet,  if 
the  Union  asks  for  a  cent  an  hour  more,  which 
is  five  cents  less  than  you  pay  in  Chicago,  his 
objections  are  based  on  the  same  grounds  as 
yours:  he  cannot  compete.  If  we  point  out 
to  him  the  fact  that  the  Chicago  employer 
pays  twenty-eight  cents,  and  the  men  in  Mil- 
waukee ask  for  twenty-six  cents  only,  he  re- 
plies that  the  Chicago  employer  has  three  dis- 
tinct advantages, — facilities  for  transporta- 
tion, an  enormous  lumber  market,  and  access 
to  labor  and  to  the  best  mechanics.  If,  there- 
fore, conditions  are  so  much  better  in  Chi- 
cago, according  to  the  employers  in  other 
cities,  it  is  reasonable  to  assume  that  wood- 
workers would  be  immigrating  here  from 
time  to  time,  while  as  a  matter  of  fact,  and 
according  to  the  report  of  the  labor  statisti- 
cian at  Springfield,  there  are  not  a  hundred 
woodworkers  in  two  years  who  came  to  Chi- 
[246] 


Argument  With  Boss. 

cago  from  these  other  woodworking  centres.' 
Then  I  pointed  out  the  advantages  of  work- 
ing in  small  cities.  The  bosses  bluffed  that 
they  would  move  their  business  to  places 
where  the  men  were  more  reasonable.  I  said 
we  would  move  there,  too;  that  we  also  did 
not  like  high  rents  and  the  nervous  turmoil  of 
the  city. 

"I  added  that  I  would  like  evidence  sup- 
porting their  contention  that  they  could  not 
compete.  The  biggest  employer  on  the  com- 
mittee arose  majestically,  and  asked  me  to 
come  to  his  office,  and  he  would  show  me  doc- 
umentary proof.  I  said,  if  I  went  alone,  it 
would  look  rather  suspicious.  But,  previous 
to  the  mass-meeting,  I  went  to  his  office;  he 
gave  me  a  cigar,  and  then  showed  me  his 
books  and  price  lists,  and  claimed  he  had  re- 
duced his  prices  twenty  per  cent.  I  discov- 
ered from  the  books  that  eighteen  per  cent 
of  the  twenty  per  cent  reduction  was  in  plate 
glass  and  mirrors,  and  I  pointed  out  to  him 
that  we  had  nothing  to  do  with  the  manufac- 
ture of  glass:  we  were  woodworkers.  He 
gave  me  an  economic  business  talk,  which 
meant  everything  or  nothing,  and  then  said: 
'Now,  Anton,  there  is  no  use  talking.  If  the 
[247] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

boys  insist  on  this  advance,  there  is  going  to 
be  a  strike.' 

"Then,  in  a  low  tone,  he  added:  'I  be- 
lieve that  if  this  matter  was  properly  ex- 
plained to  the  boys,  they  would  not  want  to 
strike.  I'd  give  a  thousand  dollars  if  I  could 
address  that  mass-meeting  and  state  the  case 
from  our  point  of  view;  or,  if  some  one  else 
would  do  it  for  me.'  He  had  previously  em- 
phasized my  influence  with  the  men.  I  took 
him  up,  to  see  how  far  he  would  go.  'Per- 
sonally,' I  said,  'I  am  in  favor  of  giving  you 
the  floor  to  explain  your  side,  provided,  of 
course,  that  one  of  our  men  answer  by  show- 
ing our  side.  Who  would  that  man  be?'  he 
asked.  *I  think  I  shall  be  the  man,'  I  replied. 
'My  God,  Anton,'  he  exclaimed,  'you  are  not 
going  to  take  the  floor  and  encourage  the  men 
in  these  demands?'  'I  can't  be  expected  to  do 
anything  else,'  I  said.  'I  am  a  woodworker, 
and  I  represent  the  men.  Besides,  I  don't 
think  a  strike  will  be  detrimental  in  the  long 
run.  The  rank  and  file  can  learn  only 
through  experience,  and  perhaps  this  experi- 
ence is  necessary  at  this  time.'  He  then  said 
that  he  could  not  speak  before  the  mass-meet- 
ing, as  he  had  no  authority  from  the  other 
[248] 


Argument  With  Boss. 

employers.  What  he  meant  by  all  this  I  shall 
not  explain.  It  would  be  guessing,  though 
it  might  be  guessing  pretty  shrewdly. 

"At  the  mass-meeting  the  men  voted  to 
strike.  Everything  possible  was  done  to  pre- 
vent it,  but  when  the  rank  and  file  become 
passionate  there  is  no  use  trying  to  argue  with 
them,  as  long  as  the  organization  is  demo- 
cratic and  there  is  such  a  thing  as  the  refer-, 
endum.  The  mass  often  acts  foolishly,  and 
this  whole  matter  of  organization  is  at  bot- 
tom only  a  question  of  education.  It  is  edu- 
cating the  working  people,  and  the  fact  that 
they  make  mistakes  is  no  argument  against  it. 
It  is  an  argument  for  it,  for  it  shows  how 
much  in  need  they  are  of  experience. 

"The  machinery  got  to  work  and  put  forth 
every  effort  to  prevent  the  actual  calling  out 
of  the  men.  Tom  Kidd  used  his  big  influ- 
ence, and  the  State  Board  of  Arbitration  did 
what  it  could.  In  this  board  I  had  very  lit- 
tle confidence.  I  was  President  of  the  Coun- 
cil, and  the  Board  of  Arbitration  invited  me 
and  others  to  a  swell  dinner  at  $io  a  head. 
This  made  me  suspicious.  I  felt  it  was  a  re- 
flection against  my  manhood.  They  tried  to 
get  me  to  use  my  influence  against  the  calling 
C  249  ] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

of  the  strike.  I  stood  pat  and  would  not  do 
it.  There  was  no  guarantee  that  the  bosses 
would  submit  to  arbitration.  So  this  matter 
fell  through.  Then  a  shop  meeting  in  every 
factory  involved  was  called,  the  object  being 
to  get  an  expression  from  every  man,  an  ab- 
solute referendum.  The  total  vote  was  1,858 
out  of  a  possible  2,000.  Sixteen  hundred  men 
voted  in  favor  of  striking,  so  there  was  noth- 
ing else  to  do.  The  strike  was  called  July 
ist,  1905,  and  every  man  of  the  2,000  went 
out.  The  men  were  so  enthusiastic  that  they 
voted  no  strike  benefits  should  be  paid  for  the 
first  two  weeks. 

"After  the  strike  had  been  on  for  a  couple 
of  weeks,  the  State  Board  of  Arbitration  made 
an  effort  to  get  the  employers'  committee  and 
our  committee  to  confer  in  reference  to  a  set- 
tlement. Both  committees  were  willing  to 
meet,  but  did  not  want  to  admit  it.  So  the 
State  Board  arranged  a  meeting  with  diplo- 
macy. It  did  not  appear  that  either  side 
wanted  it.  The  lawyers  of  the  employers 
were  at  the  conference,  the  special  reason  for 
the  lawyers  is  that  they  never  commit  the  em- 
ployers to  anything,  and  the  employers  are  so 
busy  that  they  cannot  meet  men  who  have 
[250] 


Argument  With  Boss. 

more  than  the  average  information  in  the  eco- 
nomic field,  for  labor  is  generally  right,  so 
they  employ  the  lawyers,  who  can  harp  on 
technicalities. 

"I  was  spokesman  of  the  committee.  There 
were  six  employers  present,  one  of  whom  wore 
a  star,  indicating  that  he  had  been  sworn  in 
as  a  deputy  sheriff.  He  was  the  meanest  of 
the  bosses.  There  were  not  enough  chairs, 
and  I  sat  down  in  the  only  rocking  chair,  feel- 
ing that  I  was  able  to  make  myself  at  home 
in  a  foreign  land.  The  employers'  lawyer 
began  to  speak,  but  I  interrupted  him,  and 
said  I  wanted  to  speak  first  in  order  to  put  our 
committee  in  a  light  that  would  not  be  mis- 
understood. 

"  While  we  have  no  particular  objection,' 
•I  said,  'to  meeting  with  this  deputy  sheriflP 
(pointing  to  the  employer  with  the  star),  yet 
we  want  it  distinctly  understood  that  we  are 
no  more  criminal  than  the  men  we  are  meet- 
ing.' 

"The  employers  notified  us  that  unless  their 
terms  were  met  by  the  men,  they  would  not 
admit  any  longer  the  principle  of  the  closed 
shop,  and  would  not  recognize  the  Union,  and 
offered  to  give  us  a  day's  grace  to  think  it 
[251] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

over,  in  the  interests  of  peace,  as  they  put  it. 
I  sarcastically  thanked  them  for  this  great 
concession  of  a  day,  and  called  their  attention 
to  the  fact  that  the  Union  existed,  not  because 
they  wanted  it,  and  that  it  would  continue  to 
exist,  whether  they  wanted  it  or  not.  'Ninety- 
nine  men  out  of  a  hundred,'  I  said,  'prefer  to 
trust  to  the  strength  of  the  organization  rather 
than  to  the  generosity  of  the  employer,  and, 
as  long  as  they  feel  that  way,  there  will  be  a 
Union,  whether  you  recognize  it  or  not.' 

"The  conference  came  to  nothing,  and  the 
strike  went  on.  It  was  clear  to  the  leaders 
that  the  strike  would  be  lost;  but  the  temper 
of  the  men  was  such  that  it  could  not  be 
brought  to  an  immediate  end.  The  men's 
treasury  was  being  depleted,  and  the  employ- 
ers, knowing  this,  helped  the  process  of  bank- 
ruptcy by  sending  the  riff-raff  of  the  teams- 
ters' strike  to  our  men  to  attempt  to  obtain 
money  to  get  home  with,  claiming  they  had 
been  imported,  not  knowing  there  was  a  strike 
on,  by  the  employers.  But  we  got  on  to  that 
game.  Once,  eighteen  men  came  to  us  and 
said  they  had  been  imported  from  Buffalo  to 
come  to  Chicago,  and  when  they  arrived  here 
they  found  they  were  to  be  used  to  break  the 
[252] 


Argument  With  Boss. 

strike.  They  wanted  $150  from  us  with 
which  to  return  to  Bufifalo.  We  questioned 
them  closely;  asked  them  how  it  happened,  if 
they  were  in  sympathy  with  Unionism,  as  they 
claimed,  that  they  did  not  get  suspicious 
when  they  saw  advertisements  for  so  many 
men. 

We  examined  them  as  to  their  mechanical 
qualifications  and  soon  saw  there  was  not  a 
mechanic  in  the  whole  eighteen.  While  we 
were  strongly  inclined  to  give  them  the  'edu- 
cational test'  (a  good  beating),  yet,  realizing 
that  their  lack  of  skill  made  them  compara- 
tively harmless,  and  that  only  economic  dep- 
rivation would  have  made  them  capable  of 
such  an  undermining  hold-up  game,  we  in- 
formed them  with  a  measure  of  sarcasm  that 
if  they  would  go  to  work  for  these  employers 
they  would  materially  help  our  cause  by 
showing  how  difficult  it  was  to  get  mechanics, 
even  from  Buffalo.  While  we  appreciated, 
we  said,  that  they  were  hard  up,  and  would 
like  to  help  them,  yet  we  had  men  of  our  own 
on  the  streets,  and  in  this  case  we  felt  charity 
began  at  home.  Then  we  let  them  go,  fol- 
lowed, however,  by  one  of  our  detectives. 
He  traced  them  to  the  headquarters  of  the 
[253] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

employers,  and  left  a  letter  for  the  bosses, 
previously  prepared  by  us. 

"In  this  letter  we  said:  We  thank  you 
for  your  great  consideration  in  sending  us 
these  men.  While  we  woodworkers  regret 
that  you  are  forced  to  search  the  slums  of  for- 
eign cities,  yet  we  realize  that  mechanical 
woodworkers  are  scarce;  and  to  show  our 
good  will,  and  thus  to  spare  you  any  unneces- 
sary expense,  we  write  this  letter  to  indicate 
to  you  the  folly  of  spending  more  money  in 
that  way.     Respectfully  submitted, 

"  'Mechanics.' 

"After  that  the  employers  sent  us  no  more 
men,  and  we  were  left  to  paddle  our  own 
canoe,  a  task  which  grew  more  and  more  dif- 
ficult. During  the  strike  there  was  very  lit- 
tle complaint  because  of  hunger.  There  were 
two  or  three  cases  where  wives  came  to  our 
headquarters  and  complained  because  their 
husbands  did  not  bring  their  strike  benefits 
home.  In  these  cases  the  executive  board  de- 
cided to  give  the  benefit  directly  to  the  wives. 
The  men,  as  a  rule,  got  along  pretty  well. 
The  business  agents  provided  places  where 
the  men  could  sit,  play  cards,  and  drink  beer 
[254] 


Argument  With  Boss. 

from  the  can  without  giving  their  pennies  to 
the  saloon-keepers,  who  would  get  their  pat- 
ronage when  they  went  to  work  again.  In 
that  way,  much  discontent  was  overcome.  It 
required  nearly  $4,000  to  make  one  strike  pay- 
ment to  the  men  in  our  shop.  The  money 
was  spread  on  tables,  open  to  view,  and  yet 
never  a  penny  was  lost  or  stolen.  Enthusiasm 
and  fellow-feeling  generally  rules  during  a 
strike,  even  if  the  men  have  to  look  for  work 
elsewhere.  The  feeling  is  so  intense  that  it 
is  now  almost  impossible  for  a  leader  to  sell 
out  after  the  strike  is  on.  It  is  suicidal  for 
the  leaders  to  show  the  least  sign  of  weakness. 
There  is  certainly  'graft'  at  times,  but  it  is  ex- 
aggerated by  the  newspapers,  which  are  gen- 
erally controlled  by  the  employers.  The 
leader  knows  that  to  advise  men  to  give  up 
while  the  battle  is  on  is  absolutely  disastrous 
to  his  prestige.  I  know  of  a  case  where  the 
board  of  business  agents,  four  in  number,  had 
decided  to  go  before  a  mass-meeting  of  the 
strikers,  who  had  been  out  on  strike  ten  days, 
and  recommend  them  to  accept  a  compromise 
offered  by  the  employers.  In  this  case  I  felt 
the  business  agents  were  justified,  both  from 
the  dollar  standpoint  and  from  the  standpoint 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

of  maintaining  the  integrity  of  the  Union. 
The  men  had  demanded  an  increase  of  three 
cents  an  hour  in  their  wages,  and  after  the 
strike  had  continued  ten  days,  the  employers 
ofifered  two  cents  increase,  and  the  business 
agents  advised  the  men  to  accept  this  proposal. 
The  men  rejected  the  suggestion  of  the  busi- 
ness agents,  and  three  hours  after  voting  it 
down  the  employers  completely  capitulated 
and  signed  the  agreement.  The  rank  and  file 
are  extremely  suspicious,  not  only  of  the  em- 
ployers, but  also  of  their  own  leaders,  no  mat- 
ter how  honest  they  may  be  or  how  long  they 
have  worked  in  the  interest  of  labor. 

"The  strike  went  on  until  one  of  the  busi- 
ness agents  reported  in  the  Council  that  the 
superintendent  of  the  big  plant  of  Brunswick- 
Balke  had  expressed  himself  as  in  favor  of 
the  closed  shop.  The  superintendent  thought 
it  necessary  for  the  employers  to  win  this 
fight,  but  he  dreaded  the  idea  that  perhaps 
the  result  would  be  the  open  shop ;  he  did  not 
relish  the  prospect  of  having  in  his  shop  750 
employees  whom  he  would  have  to  discipline 
through  his  own  efiforts,  without  the  assist- 
ance of  the  Union.  In  the  closed  shop  it  is 
practicable  for  the  Union  to  check  the  erratic 
[256] 


Argument  With  Boss. 

discontent  and  the  unjust  discrimination 
against  one  another,  among  the  men,  from  the 
purely  stupid,  selfish  point  of  view.  If  one 
employee  is  unjust  to  another,  redress  can  be 
obtained  from  the  organization  through  the 
shop  steward  without  recourse  to  the  super- 
intendent. The  employer  or  his  representa- 
tive is  thus  relieved  of  the  burden  of  adjust- 
ing differences  between  one  employee  and  an- 
other. A  man  will  stand  a  lot  of  abuse  from 
another  man  before  he  will  appeal  to  the  fore- 
man. That  is  more  or  less  disgraceful,  but 
where  the  Union  rule?  are  in  vogue,  there  is  a 
shop  steward,  an  official  of  the  Union,  whose 
specific  business  it  is  to  look  after  such  mat- 
ters, and  a  complaint  to  him  is  considered 
proper — a  complaint  against  either  another 
workman  or  against  the  employer.  Experi- 
ence has  shown  that,  especially  where  the  shop 
is  a  large  one,  the  Union  is  far  superior  to  the 
non-union  shop  in  harmony  and  order. 

"The  superintendent  of  the  Brunswick- 
Balke  concern  therefore  hinted  that  if  a  com- 
mittee with  full  power  was  selected  to  make 
some  proposition  more  favorable  than  the 
original  one,  a  settlement  might  be  arrived 
at.  This  was  done;  a  committee  of  thirty- 
[257] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

six,  selected  from  the  various  shops  on  strike, 
was  appointed,  the  most  ridiculous  and  im- 
politic thing,  in  my  judgment,  that  they  could 
have  done.  The  committee  was  altogether 
too  large.  It  was  like  the  weakest  element  of 
an  army  going  to  the  strongest  element  of  the 
enemy  and  proposing  peace.  A  strong  ele- 
ment in  a  labor  union  is  the  man  highly 
skilled  in  his  trade,  who  has  a  reasonable 
measure  of  information  and  a  fair  power  of 
expression.  Another  strong  element  is  the 
man  who  is  selected  as  walking  delegate. 
His  strength  lies  in  not  being  under  obliga- 
tions to  his  employer.  He  is  paid  by  the 
Union. 

"But  both  these  elements  were  absent  from 
this  committee  of  thirty-six,  which  had  full 
power  to  act.  If  the  rank  and  file  had  any 
tact  at  all,  they  either  would  have  rejected  en- 
tirely the  proposition  to  delegate  the  full 
power  to  a  committee,  or  else  they  would  have 
preferred  a  committee  of  the  strongest  char- 
acter. The  only  reason  for  selecting  the  com- 
mittee of  thirty-six  was  the  suspiciousness  al- 
ways lurking  in  the  rank  and  file.  They  pre- 
ferred the  honest  fool  or  simple  coward  to  a 
strong  man  whom  they  suspected,  without 
[258] 


Argument  With  Boss. 

realizing  that  men,  no  matter  how  dishonest, 
cannot  do  worse  than  a  committee  of  fools. 

"It  was  in  reality  the  fault  of  the  business 
agents.  They  were  too  weak  to  point  out 
these  facts  fearlessly  to  the  rank  and  file,  for 
fear  it  would  not  be  taken  in  good  grace.  It 
is  difficult  for  the  leader  to  tell  the  crowd  the 
truth.  But  it  is  certainly  true  that  the  auto- 
cratic labor  leader  is  more  likely  to  get  re- 
sults than  the  democratic  leader.  When  the 
power  is  centralized,  as  it  is,  comparatively 
speaking,  in  the  Miners*  and  Carpenters' 
Unions,  the  employers  can  be  approached 
more  effectively.  The  delegate  is  then  re- 
sponsible to  a  body  of  men  (the  Council), 
who  are  much  superior  to  the  rank  and  file 
in  observation  and  the  power  of  initiative. 
To  an  office  of  this  kind  efficiency  rather  than 
good-fellowship  generally  elects. 

"This  democratic  committee  of  thirty-six 
met  the  bosses'  committee  and  agreed,  without 
a  protest,  to  everything  proposed  to  them. 
The  chairman  of  this  grand  committee  put  his 
tail  between  his  legs  like  a  whipped  cur  and 
said  nothing.  The  strike  was  called  off  and 
the  men  completely  defeated.  If,  however, 
this  last  meeting  had  been  well  managed  we 
[259] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

would  probably  have  secured  some  conces- 
sions. As  it  was,  however,  we  did  succeed  in 
maintaining  the  closed  shop  and  the  organiza- 
tion intact;  although,  as  a  general  rule,  when 
a  strike  is  lost,  the  Union  is  likely  to  be  dis- 
integrated. Funds  and  hope  are  gone,  and  it 
needs  both,  and  energy  in  addition,  to  build 
the  organization  up  again. 

"One  great  trouble  in  the  calling  and  man- 
aging of  strikes  is  this  infernal  preaching  of 
the  necessity  of  honesty.  It  is  preached  by 
all  the  moralists,  by  all  the  theorists,  and  by 
all  the  politicians,  but  not  by  the  real  labor 
leaders — not  because  they  don't  believe  in 
honesty,  but  because  of  the  terrible  disadvan- 
tage it  places  the  workman  in.  The  rank  and 
file  generally  recognizes  inability  as  the  best 
evidence  of  honesty.  If  you  are  aggressive 
and  a  good  speaker,  they  are  suspicious. 
They  are  taught  that  honesty  is  the  most  im- 
portant thing — but  it  is  not  the  most  important 
thing.  They  have  been  hoodwinked  so  often 
by  everybody  that  they  distrust  intelligence. 
And  yet  the  labor  movement  is  far  more  in 
need  of  intelligence  than  it  is  of  honesty.  Of 
honesty  we  have  enough  and  to  burn.  An 
honest  man,  if  he  is  not  strong,  can  get  noth- 
[260] 


Argument  With  Boss. 

ing  from  the  employers,  while  a  dishonest  man 
can  do  no  worse ;  he  cannot  reduce  your  wages. 
So  why  not  be  gamblers  and  take  the  men  with 
qualifications  regardless  of  whether  primarily 
honest  or  not?" 

Anton  himself  is  as  honest  as  the  day.  He 
feels  the  excitement  of  honesty,  of  telling  the 
truth  in  place  and  out.  But  his  feeling  of  the 
relative  unimportance  of  honesty  is  natural 
enough,  and  is  shared  by  many  of  the  more 
active  labor  leaders.  They  feel  that  the  hon- 
esty of  the  present  day,  as  embodied  in  present 
law  and  custom,  puts  their  class  at  a  disadvan- 
tage. They  see  that  a  man  may  be  called  hon- 
est and  yet  be  humanly  unkind  and  funda- 
mentally unfair.  And  the  "crooked"  deeds 
of  men  like  Parks  they  cannot  deeply  con- 
demn, for  he  was,  they  think,  sincerely  inter- 
ested in,  and  helpful  to,  the  wx)rking  class. 
His  sins  were  sins  against  the  morality  formed 
to  strengthen  the  capitalistic  class  in  what 
they  unfairly  possess — so  they  think.  Feeling 
sceptically  about  all  law,  they  tend  to  look, 
when  it  comes  to  a  moral  judgment,  at  the  en- 
tire upshot  of  a  man's  actions  and  life.  If  on 
the  whole  he  is  useful  to  the  big  mass  of  his 
fellow  men,  he  is  on  the  whole  a  good  man. 
and  "property"  sins  are  very  venial  sins  in- 
deed. 

[261] 


CHAPTER  XIII. 

^An  Anarchist  Salon. 

One  night  Anton  and  I  were  working  in 
my  room.  He  was  telling  me  about  some  of 
his  experiences,  over  our  beer  and  cigarettes, 
when  he  suddenly  pushed  back  his  chair  and 
said,  as  he  often  did  say — it  was  lamentably 
frequent  with  him  in  our  work  together: 

"I  don't  feel  like  work  to-night,  Hapgood. 
I  don't  like  to  be  tied  down  to  anything.  It's 
bad  enough  to  have  to  work  all  day  in  the  shop 
at  routine  work,  but  then  to  tie  myself  down 
to  you  three  times  a  week  at  night  seems  like 
voluntary  slavery.  I  hate  to  think  there  is 
anything  I  have  to  do.  It  is  a  wonder  to  me 
I  have  held  my  job  so  long.  Even  yet,  when 
the  springtime  comes,  I  hear  the  whistles  blow 
and  want  to  change  scenes." 

I  had  learned  to  know  his  mood,  and  to 

know  that  if  I  insisted  on  anything  his  back 

went  up  against  it  immediately.     He  hates  to 

be  urged,  to  be  invited,  even.     When  not  at 

[262] 


An  Anarchist  Salon. 

work  he  likes  to  live  altogether  the  life  of  the 
temperament.  So  when  he  suggested  on  that 
night  to  go  out  and  call  on  Terry  and  Marie, 
I  said,  very  cheerfully,  "All  right."  More- 
over, I  had  not  met  Terry  and  Marie,  or  as 
yet  any  of  the  more  interesting  among  the 
"radicals."  So  I  was  particularly  cheerful  in 
my  assent. 

He  led  me  to  a  "slummy"  place  on  the 
West  Side.  We  groped  our  way  up  a  dark 
staircase  and  into  a  small,  bare  apartment,  the 
only  furniture  of  which  was  three  beds,  usu- 
ally occupied,  as  I  afterwards  found,  by  four 
or  five  persons;  a  table  and  a  few  chairs. 
Everything  indicated  extreme  poverty,  but  the 
floor  was  clean  and  there  was  a  kind  of  awk- 
ward attempt  at  neatness  shown  in  the  general 
appearance  of  the  place. 

On  the  table  in  the  front  room  there  were 
three  or  four  books.  On  this  first  visit  I  no- 
ticed a  collection  of  Bernard  Shaw's  plays,  a 
volume  of  Ibsen  and  a  copy  of  Spencer's 
"First  Principles."  A  dark-haired,  anaemic- 
looking,  but  striking  and  noble-faced  girl  was 
reading  "Mrs.  Warren's  Profession"  as  we  en- 
tered. An  equally  anaemic,  but  intelligent- 
appearing  man  was  lying  on  the  bed,  smok- 
[263] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

ing  a  cigarette.  They  received  us  with  sim- 
plicity, offered  us  cigarettes,  and  we  engaged 
in  talk  about  literature,  and  society,  and  mor- 
ality. In  the  course  of  the  evening  others 
came  in,  of  the  same  kind,  and  I  found  this 
place  was  a  kind  of  salon,  where  people  of  a 
certain  sort  met  and  discussed  ideas. 

They  all  called  themselves  anarchists,  phil- 
osophical anarchists,  as  distinguished  from 
the  violent,  bomb-throwing  kind.  They  were 
a  curious,  gentle  lot,  in  manner  and  appear- 
ance. Anton  and  I  seemed  like  barbarians  in 
comparison.  They  believed  to  a  large  extent 
in  "non-resistance,"  and  would  not  hurt  a  flea. 
They  were  obviously  lacking  in  energy,  and 
altogether  seemed  like  an  extremely  harmless 
eddy  in  the  current  of  social  life.  They 
talked  about  the  "conservative"  people  with 
mild  contempt,  but  were  not  inclined,  appar- 
ently, to  carry  on  propaganda  with  any  force. 
They  did  not  seem  to  have  the  energy  for  it. 
They  seemed  to  desire  mainly  to  be  allowed  to 
live  as  they  please,  with  as  little  social  re- 
straint as  possible. 

"I  like  to  live  in  the  slums,"  said  Terry,  the 
man  on  the  bed,  "for  there  is  more  freedom 
there  than  anywhere  else.  Your  neighbors 
[264] 


An  Anarchist  Salon. 

are  neither  proper  nor  inquisitive,  and  com- 
paratively speaking,  you  can  do  as  you  like." 

Terry  had  been  a  skilled  mechanic,  a  tan- 
ner, and  had  worked  hard  at  an  earlier  period. 
Indeed,  all  these  people  belong  to  the  labor- 
ing class.  They  come  in  contact  with  eco- 
nomic hardship  or  injustice  and  then  they  go 
to  the  extreme  of  theory  and  become  anarch- 
ists. Terry  had  worked  for  many  years  so- 
berly and  industriously.  He  is  a  man  of  very 
unusual  intelligence.  One  day  he  became 
aware,  he  said,  that  he  was  being  exploited, 
and  he  quit;  and  he  has  never  worked  at  his 
trade  since.  That  was  about  twelve  years  ago. 
Before  quitting  work  he  had  never  read,  but 
then  he  began  to  read  and  think.  He  began 
with  Tolstoi,  and  Kropotkin,  and  Tucker, 
and  Spencer,  and  became  familiar  with  the 
local  turn  put  to  these  ideas  by  Clarence  Dar- 
row.  He  became  also  a  student  of  poetry  and 
literature,  and  this  instinct  and  love  for  the 
beautiful  in  expression  limits  to  a  certain  ex- 
tent his  anarchism. 

"There  is  no  such  thing,"  he  said,  "as  the 

purely    economic    man.     If    there    were,    I 

would  be   an   absolute  anarchist.     But  man 

lives  not  only  on  food,  but  on  sentiment  and 

[265] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

on  ideas  and  on  beauty.  So  whatever  we  may 
say  against  government,  we  must  accept  a  part 
of  the  traditions  of  history  and  of  literature." 

He  has  decided,  however,  that  it  is  wrong 
to  work  for  society,  so  he  lives  in  a  garret  on 
crusts,  beer  and  high  thoughts.  He  lives  with 
the  dark-haired,  interestingly  temperamental 
and  passionate  girl,  whose  name  is  Marie. 
She  is  many  years  younger  than  Terry,  and 
her  life  has  been  typical  of  the  woman  an- 
archist. 

She  began  to  work  in  the  factories  when  she 
was  ten  years  old — first  in  a  lead  factory 
where  the  lie  burnt  her  fingers  to  the  marrow. 
She  worked  ten  hours  a  day  for  two  dol- 
lars a  week — money  badly  needed  by  her 
mother,  who  was  married  to  a  drunken  me- 
chanic, always  out  of  a  job.  She  worked  in 
other  factories,  always  hard  and  always  at 
low  wages.  It  hurt  her  health,  and  when  she 
was  sixteen  she  became  rebellious,  was  ready 
for  almost  anything.  She  threw  herself  into 
the  arms  of  a  lover,  a  young  fellow  of  her  own 
age,  and  thought  she  was  happy,  although  she 
kept  up  her  hard  labor. 

A  year  afterwards  she  met  Terry,  who  had 
already  been  an  anarchist  and  garret  philoso- 
[266] 


An  Anarchist  Salon. 

pher  for  many  years.  He  took  her  to  his 
salon  and  read  Swinburne  to  her. 

"It  was  the  happiest  moment  of  my  life," 
she  said.  "I  saw  that  life  had  some  beauty 
in  it,  and  I  loved  Terry  at  once.  I  left  the 
young  fellow,  who  meant  nothing  to  me,  and 
have  been  living  with  Terry  ever  since.  You 
may  think  it  strange,  as  I  am  only  twenty- 
three  now,  and  that  was  five  years  ago,  and 
Terry  is  forty-six.  I  like  young  men,  too, 
but  Terry  has  meant  life  to  me." 

She  quit  the  factory,  and  the  two  have  lived 
in  the  garrets  of  Chicago's  slums  ever  since, 
reading,  smoking,  thinking.  But  how?  may 
be  a  natural  question.  ^ 

There  was  another  woman  present  at  this 
gathering  when  I  first  met  the  anarchists  of 
Chicago,  whose  life  and  character  explained 
how  Terry  and  Marie  can  live  as  they  do. 
Katie  is  her  name,  and  she  loves  "Culture," 
though  she  can  satirize  it,  and  has  none  of  it 
herself.  It  is  through  her  love  of  "Culture" 
that  Marie  and  Terry  can  live  as  they  do. 

She  is  a  cook,  very  witty  and  lively,  but  en- 
tirely ignorant  of  literature.  She  thinks 
Terry  and  Marie  are  charming, — as  they 
really  are — and  great  in  every  way.  Katie  is 
[267] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

a  sport,  though  an  uneducated  one,  and  so  she 
"keeps"  Terry  and  Marie.  That  is  to  say,  she 
supports  them  out  of  the  $9  a  week  she  makes 
as  cook  in  a  Chicago  restaurant.  She  works 
all  day,  while  they  read,  smoke,  drink  and 
talk;  then  she  comes  home,  at  night,  with 
something  to  eat,  looking  forward  to  a  few 
hours  of  pleasure,  with  her  two  cultivated 
ones.  She  is  a  devoted,  willing  slave,  while 
they  are  the  aristocrats  of  the  slums — aris- 
tocrats who  express  the  philosophy  of  the 
rebellious  proletariat.  That  philosophy  is 
anarchism;  as  it  is  rebellion  against  the  in- 
stitutions, not  against  the  ideals,  of  mankind, 
they  do  not  like  this  dependence,  this  parasit- 
ism on  another  human  being.  But  it  is  easy 
to  accept  devotion. 

"I  do  not  like  to  be  a  parasite,"  said  Terry, 
"but  I  don't  see  what's  to  be  done  about  it. 
I  would  work  if  I  saw  any  work  worth  do- 
ing; and  if  I  could  work  for  something  except 
organized  society.  After  all,  I  live  on  one 
person  who  supports  me  voluntarily,  while 
your  capitalist  lives  on  thousands  who  are 
forced  to  work  for  him." 

He  and  Marie  recognize  the  inconsistency 
of  their  attitude.  They  do  not  claim  to  be 
[268] 


An  Anarchist  Salon. 

virtuous,  but  they  cannot  see  but  what  all 
society  is  organized  on  at  least  an  equally  un- 
just and  parasitic  basis. 

On  the  night  of  my  first  meeting  with  Terry 
and  Marie,  he  and  I  talked  mainly  about 
poetry  and  literature  and  abstract  concep- 
tions of  justice  and  I  found  him,  then,  one 
of  the  subtlest,  most  self-consciously  psycho- 
logical spirits  I  have  ever  known — full  of  per- 
versity, but  wonderfully  logical  about  it  all 
— this  man  who  had  never  had  a  school  edu- 
cation, but  who  had  thought  independently, 
though  often  in  my  opinion  wrongfully,  about 
life.  He  had  had  not  only  his  experience  as 
a  mechanic,  his  experience  as  a  rebel,  but 
also  a  career  of  unusual  deprivation  and 
toughness,  and  the  result  was  not  what  might 
have  been  expected.  Instead  of  finding  a 
rough,  uncouth  and  violent  personality  as  a 
result  of  all  this,  I  found  myself  in  contact 
with  a  man  of  excellent  manners,  of  a  subtle 
and  experienced  mind,  of  a  marked  and  rela- 
tively consistent  individuality. 

As   I   saw  more  of  him — and   I   became, 

through  some  weeks,  a  regular  visitor  at  his 

salon — my  impression  was  confirmed.     There, 

over  the  beer  and  cigarettes,  I  sat  often  with 

[269] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

him  and  Marie  till  long  past  midnight,  fasci- 
nated by  his  experience,  his  character  and  his 
expressiveness;  and  by  the  girl's  emotional 
nature  and  untrained  capacity  for  expressing 
an  idea  in  an  artistic  way. 

Maggie  and  Anton  feel  the  charm  of  these 
two  beings,  although  to  their  active  natures 
the  far  niente  attitude  is  not  agreeable.  Said 
Maggie:  "Terry  is  a  fine  man,  a  beautiful 
character.  He  talks  to  everybody  so  sweetly. 
He  listens  to  what  a  child  will  say,  and  is  very 
good.  There  is  only  one  thing  I  have  against 
him.  He  won't  work.  He  gets  cast-down 
and  drinks;  but  he  never  drinks  much  except 
when  he  works.  He  tried  being  a  drummer 
for  a  while,  but  was  a  failure  because  he  could 
not  sell  things  to  people  when  they  didn't  need 
them.  He  don't  like  to  come  to  our  house  be- 
cause I  work  so  hard  it  reminds  him  he  doesn't 
work,  and  he  is  sensitive  about  it.  Marie 
doesn't  want  Terry  to  work,  for  then  his 
tongue  is  violent.  Work  does  not  agree  with 
him." 

Marie  says  the  same  thing;  she  does  not 
want  Terry  to  work,  although  she  is  often 
hungry  and  has  often  to  go  without  her  cigar- 
ettes. "He  is  in  a  bad  mood  when  he  works," 
[270] 


An  Anarchist  Salon. 

she  said.  Once,  however,  late  at  night,  when 
Marie's  tobacco  was  all  gone,  and  there  was 
no  way  of  getting  more,  she  burst  out  against 
Terry,  and  said  he  couldn't  even  keep  her  sup- 
plied in  cigarettes !  He  seemed  cast-down  by 
this  and  sad,  and  she  repented  and  explained 
to  me  how  much  Terry  really  did  exert  him- 
self. 

"It  is  not  an  easy  thing,"  she  said,  "to  get 
along  without  working.  Terry  has  to  be  very 
clever  to  do  it.  It  takes  skill,  more  skill  than 
to  work." 

She  certainly  loves  this  man  who  has  meant 
freedom,  thought,  poetry,  refinement  to  her. 
She  has  taken,  of  course,  his  ideas,  but  into 
them  she  has  put  her  own  individuality  and 
given  them  a  characteristic  turn.  He  has 
taught  her  many  things — one  thing,  to  be  a 
"free-lover."  Though  she  loves  Terry,  she 
likes  other  men,  and  Terry  encourages  her 
to  be  what  he  calls  absolutely  "free."  She 
carries  out  his  ideas  with  completeness;  and 
does  not  find  it  a  hardship.  But  she  is  very 
jealous  of  Terry,  if  he  shows  any  inclination 
for  another  woman's  society. 

"Yes,  it  is  inconsistent,"  she  admitted,  "but 
our  logic  does  not  count  when  our  fundamen- 
[271] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

tal  feelings  are  aroused.  Terry  does  not  mind 
what  I  do — that  is  his  affair.  It  is  very  fine 
in  him,  but  I  don't  think  it  is  very  wise.  Per- 
haps I  would  be  better  if  he  were  jealous. 
But  I  mind  what  he  does,  I  can  tell  you. 
Theories  don't  count  in  these  things.  We 
'radicals,'  in  spite  of  all  our  theories,  are  as 
jealous  and  human  as  anybody,  perhaps  a  lit- 
tle more  so." 

Anton  likes  Terry  and  Marie,  and  he  finds 
it  attractive  to  be  with  them.  But  he  is  aware 
of  their  limitations.  Going  back  with  him, 
after  this  visit  to  the  salon  in  the  garret,  he 
said:  ^ 

"I  cannot  see  how  Terry  can  live  as  he  does. 
It  is  true,  working  for  a  living  is  not  what 
it  is  cracked  up  to  be.  It  is  foolish  to  work 
unless  one  has  to  or  unless  one  has  a  higher 
aim ;  as  the  Socialist  I  met  in  the  box-car  years 
ago  used  to  say:  nothing  is  necessary  except 
the  luxuries.  And  Terry  and  Marie  get  the 
luxuries  of  thought.  They  are  aristocrats, 
but  they  pay  too  much  for  it.  Terry  hates 
posing.  He  is  not  an  egotist  and  he  talks 
about  the  subject.  But  I  can't  afford  to  be 
with  these  people  too  often — that  is,  the  better 
ones  among  them.  It  would  take  away  from 
[272] 


An  Anarchist  Salon. 

my  activity  in  the  trade-union  movement. 
The  anarchists  are  so  intellectual,  they  say, 
what's  the  use?  And  that  is  discouraging  to 
a  man  who  wants  to  accomplish  things.  The 
anarchists  are  all  right — at  least  Terry  is — 
when  it  comes  to  thinking,  but  they  are  prac- 
tically very  unreasonable.  They  are  in  this 
respect  like  the  Socialists.  One  of  them  said 
to  me  not  long  ago :  'You  are  a  trade-union- 
ist every  day  in  the  year  except  election  day 
and  then  you  are  a  scab,  for  you  don't  vote 
with  the  Socialists.'  The  trouble  with  these 
people  is  that  they  think  there  is  no  way  of 
doing  things  but  their  own.  They  are  always 
roasting  me  because  I  am  a  trades-unionist. 
The  Socialists  shout  that  trades-unionists  are 
corrupt,  and  the  anarchists  say  everybody  but 
themselves  are  corrupt.  It's  fierce.  And 
yet  I  must  see  a  good  deal  of  these  people. 
They  have  free  thoughts  and  some  of  them 
think  more  than  the  average  workingman. 

"Many  of  them  feel  bitter  just  because  they 
are  superior  mentally.  Very  few  of  the  un- 
derpaid, day  laborers  feel  bitter  about  things. 
The  kickers  you  will  find  among  the  intelli- 
gent mechanics.  The  laborers  hope  to  go  to 
heaven.*  Their  condition  of  poverty  is  so 
[273] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

abominable  that  they  are  busy  keeping  soul 
and  body  together  and  don't  think  about  eco- 
nomic conditions.  They  accept  God,  and 
don't  think." 

Anton  and  I  had  left  the  car,  and  were 
walking  past  a  church,  near  his  home.  He 
pointed  to  the  building,  and  said,  with  bitter- 
ness :  "Damn  that.  It  was  that  that  kept  me 
back.  It  was  that  that  said  to  me  it  was  re- 
ligious to  be  poor,  that  work  is  a  blessing,  and 
contentment  is  good  and  all  that  tommyrot. 
If  we  working  men  don't  look  after  ourselves, 
nobody  will,  not  even  God.  We  must  organ- 
ize, we  must  fight,  to  get  what  men  and  women 
ought  to  have,  to  make  life  any  good.  And 
we  are  roasted  for  this,  not  only  by  the  min- 
isters but  by  the  anarchists  who  don't  believe 
in  doing  anything  except  being  good,  except 
perhaps  sometimes  throwing  a  bomb,  to  draw 
attention  to  how  good  they  are.  < 

"Of  course,  it  is  not  a  question  of  starving," 
he  went  on.  "Not  for  most  of  us.  But  it 
is  almost  better  to  starve  than  not  to  have  a 
great  deal  more  than  what  is  absolutely  neces- 
sary. A  laborer  with  a  large  family  gener- 
ally quarrels  with  his  wife.  During  the  en- 
tire day  his  mind  is  centred  on  the  dinner 
[274] 


An  Anarchist  Salon. 

hour.  No  time  to  think.  At  least,  there  is 
not  affection  in  these  homes,  as  a  rule.  They 
have  no  time  to  be  interested  in  each  other. 
The  man,  if  a  drinker,  spends  more  than  he 
ought  to,  and  that  creates  discord.  Most  of 
the  children  stand  by  their  mother;  but  if  she 
puts  up  with  a  man  who  is  extremely  careless, 
that  has  a  tendency  to  make  the  children  think 
he  is  not  as  bad  as  he  really  is ;  and  that  gives 
them  wrong  ideas.  So  it  is  bad  anyway. 
Conflicting  ideas  assassinate  the  love  of  man, 
wife  and  children. 

"It  is  easy  to  be  an  anarchist,  if  one  thinks. 
But  if  a  man  wants  to  act,  he  can't  be  a  con- 
sistent anarchist.  The  whole  thing  can  be 
traced  back  to  economics,  to  this  matter  of 
dollars  and  cents.  The  more  a  man  sees  the 
injustice  of  wealth,  the  harder  it  is  to  work. 
Terry  kicked  so  hard  that  he  quit  work,  and 
is  now  a  leisure-class  person.  He  is  now  a 
capitalist  without  capital.  He  thinks  eco- 
nomics less  important  than  literature,  because 
he  possesses  literature  and  doesn't  possess 
money.  But  you  can't  get  the  average  man 
interested  in  literature. 

"You  can  improve  the  average  man,  how- 
ever,'by  giving  him  more  money.  He  then 
[  275  ] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

will  become  capable  of  better  things.  When 
I  used  to  get  only  $i6  or  $17  a  week  and  had 
to  support  a  family,  I  found  life  was  not 
what  it  is  cracked  up  to  be.  I  could  not  de- 
velop my  family  and  social  instincts;  couldn't 
ever  buy  a  newspaper.  Such  a  life  makes  a 
man  stupidly  selfish.  But  these  last  few 
years,  when  I  have  made  a  few  dollars  more, 
I  have  developed  my  social  instinct,  a  desire 
to  read  and  think.  It  makes  all  the  differ- 
ence, I  can  tell  you,  a  few  dollars  a  week." 

A  few  nights  after  that,  Anton,  Maggie  and 
I  went  to  an  anarchists'  "social";  where  I 
met  the  whole  "bunch"  of  the  more  extreme 
of  the  Chicago  radicals.  I  found  that  they 
all  were  working  people,  or  had  been  with 
the  exception  of  the  anarchist  poet,  an  Amer- 
ican of  bourgeois  family  who  had  become 
what  Anton  calls  the  "King  of  the  Anar- 
chists." 

The  social  side  at  this  meeting  was  indeed 
strong.  I  had  never  been  to  a  gathering  of 
people  who  seemed  so  much  at  home  together. 
It  was  first  names  everywhere,  kisses  and  em- 
braces. The  beer  flowed  freely,  speeches 
were  made  about  liberty  and  love,  everybody 
kissed  everybody  else's  girl,  and  all  were 
[276] 


An  Anarchist  Salon. 

happy.  The  ordinary  conventions  of  con- 
servative society  were  removed.  Extreme 
naturalness  was  the  note,  and  yet  it  all  seemed 
very  harmless.  They  were  working  people 
who  had  decided  to  have  a  very  good  time  in 
their  own  way;  if  they  could  not  transcend 
the  social  conventions,  they  could  at  least  cut 
under  them.  In  spite  of  all  this  freedom, 
however,  the  women  were  gentle  and  intelli- 
gent; there  was  not  a  suggestion  of  tough- 
ness about  the  occasion.  They  were  all  peo- 
ple with  ideas;  so  much  is  an  idea  loved  in 
that  society  that  a  man  rich  in  these  cerebral 
concomitants  finds  himself  very  popular  with 
the  women — it  is  a  surer  way  to  succeed 
with  them  than  unlimited  ducats  and  gaiety. 
The  men  and  women  genuinely  love  ideas, 
temperament  and  poetry.  There  is  no  fake 
about  it,  as  is  often  the  case  in  conservative 
society,  if  indeed  there  is  any  desire  for  it  at 
all  there. 

Terry  and  Marie  were  present,  dressed  in 
their  best,  which  was  very  simple.  Marie 
was  looking  for  H ,  who  had  not  yet  ap- 
peared. "I  wish  he  would  come,"  she  said, 
enthusiastically.  "Why,  you  know,  he  is  a 
man  who  was  imprisoned  for  a  long  time  in 
[277] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

Austria  because  of  his  political  ideas.  He 
also  escaped  from  an  insane  asylum.  He  is 
a  genius,  full  of  character.  I  love  him 
dearly.  I  would  rather  live  w^ith  him  in  jail 
than  with  an  ordinary  man  in  luxury."  Her 
deep,  large  dark  eyes  shone  intensely.  In  her 
look  was  the  aesthetic  side  of  the  fanaticism 
which  brings  joy  to  the  revolutionist. 

Soon  after,   H appeared.     He  kissed 

warmly  all  his  friends,  including  Marie,  who 
introduced  him  to  me.  But  at  the  moment 
he  saw  a  man  dancing  with  a  dark  Jewish  girl, 
who  worked  in  the  factory  and  was  in  love 
with  the  Poet.  v 

"Excuse  me,"  said  H — ,  excitedly,  "I  see 
a  damn  fool  over  there.     I  must  go  and  kiss 

him."    A  little  later  I  asked  H what  he 

meant  by  admiring  a  man  whom  he  thought 
a  fool.  "All  good  men  are  fools  in  this 
world,"  he  said.  "They  pass  for  fools  with 
conservative  people.  I  love  only  those  peo- 
ple who  do  the  unwise  thing.  If  a  man  suc- 
ceeds, he  is  not  a  fool,  and  is  not  for  me.  I 
never  knew  a  man  with  brains  and  sympathy 
combined  who  was  not  a  fool.  That  man  is 
one  of  them,  and  that  is  why  I  love  him." 

H —  is  a  journalist  woking  now  on  a  Ger- 
[278] 


An  Anarchist  Salon. 

man   anarchist  paper  in   Chicago.     He   has 
been  a  feuilletonist  in  Vienna  and  other  Ger- 
man cities  and  his  talk  reminds  one  in  tone  of 
Jugend  and  Simplicissimus.     He  and  Terry 
and  I  foregathered  at  the  improvised  bar,  and 
he   spoke   of    his    imprisonment:     "My    ten 
years'  imprisonment  did  me  great  good,"  he 
said.     "I  had  a  chance  to  be  alone  and  to 
think  things  out.     No  one  has  a  right  to  call 
his  soul  his  own  until  he  has  been  imprisoned. 
'You    treat    political    prisoners    (anarchists) 
worse  in  America  than  they  are  treated  any- 
where else  in  the  world.    You  treat  them  like 
common  felons.     In  England,  they  are  treated 
much  better.     You  get  the  worst  things  from 
England,  and  leave  the  best.    The  English 
are  really  tolerant.     Their  police  don't  run 
into  jail  for  disorderly  conduct  men  who  are 
making  speeches,  anarchistic  or  otherwise,  or 
publishing  papers  about  sex  or  government. 
But  here  they  do.     In  England,  they  have  no 
trouble  with  the  anarchists,  for  they  let  them 
talk  and  write  as  much  as  they  want.     The 
English  are  away  ahead  of  the  Americans  in 
real  toleration  and  sense  of  justice.     Look  at 
the  execution  of  the  anarchists  in  Chicago. 
That  could  not  have  happened  in  England. 
[279] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

It  is  impossible,  of  course,  to  be  free  any- 
where. I  cannot  be  free  in  what  I  write  even 
in  our  anarchist  newspaper.  I  must  be  a 
hypocrite  even  there.  I  must  write  on  the 
level  of  the  small  bourgeois  intelligence.  It 
is  a  fierce  world." 

The  three  of  us  talked  about  Anton.  I 
praised  him  warmly  and  said:  "He  has  not 
read  much,  and  knows  nothing  about  litera- 
ture, etc.,  but  he  is  a  real  personality,  one  who 
is  able  to  get  into  life  and  when  in,  to  think 
about  it  with  point."  H would  have  em- 
braced me,  so  enthusiastically  did  he  agree 
with  this  remark.  "The  real  people,"  he 
said,  "are  among  the  active  workers.  There 
is  no  doubt  about  that.  There  would  be 
nothing  in  socialism  or  anarchism  if  it  were 
not  for  the  workers.  There  wouldn't  be  any- 
thing, anywhere,  if  it  were  not  for  the  work- 
ers. Sometimes  all  this  strength,  sweetness 
and  vigor  of  the  class  is  shown  in  one  man 
who  can  talk.     Such  a  man  is  Anton." 

Then  he  spoke,  rather  slightingly,  of  the 
Anarchist  Poet,  who  was  present  at  the  social, 
very  attentive  to  all  the  women.     This  poet, 

B ,  is  sometimes  called  "King."     He  is 

not  of  the  working  class,  but  goes  among  the 
[280] 


An  Anarchist  Salon, 

"radical"  people  of  that  class.  He  likes  to 
eat  and  drink,  perhaps  excessively,  and  in 
other  things  of  the  sense  is  distinguished. 
He  talks  poetry  and  dresses  and  looks  aes- 
thetic. The  women  all  like  him,  because  they 
think  he  represents  beauty  and  idealism.  A 
factory  girl  is  in  love  with  him  and  follows 
him  around  like  a  dog  to  all  the  meetings. 
He  prides  himself  on  his  power  of  capturing 
women.  The  real  working  people  look  up  to 
him,  because  he  seems  to  have  what  they  have 
not — education  and  a  grasp  at  what  they  feel 

are  the  higher  things.     But  H ^  was  right 

when  he  said  this  poet  was  inferior  to  his  ad- 
mirers. "They  like  him,"  he  said,  "because 
they  are  good  people,  with  high  ideals,  not 
because  he  is." 

There  is  no  love  lost,  however,  between 
Anton  and  the  poet,  B .  For  Anton,  al- 
though he  is  an  idealist,  yet  is  a  shrewd  per- 
son, made  keen  in  the  detection  of  fakes  from 
his  experience  in  life.  He  sees  through  B.'s 
superficiality  as  a  man,  although  he  is  imposed 
upon  by  his  "genius,"  and  his  poetry.  He 
quotes  often  with  approval  Katie's  way  of  re- 
ceiving him,  when  he  comes  to  see  Terry  and 
Marie.  Katie  is  the  shrewd  cook,  and  she 
[281] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

calls  B ,  "the  potato  poet"  and  always  has 

potato  soup  for  him.  She  sees,  too,  that 
B is  a  mere  sensualist,  not  really  inter- 
ested in  the  movement,  interested  only  in  get- 
ting as  much  as  he  can  from  the  radical 
women,  whose  ideas  render  them  susceptible 
to  poets,  and  from  the  "comrades"  among  the 
men,  and  give  them  only  his  genius  and  his 
egotism  in  return.  This  seems  to  Anton  and 
Katie  like  a  big  graft;  they  are  perhaps  the 
two  hardest  workers  in  the  "radical  bunch" 
and  in  some  ways  have  the  keenest  vision; 
though  one  is  a  cook  and  the  other  a  wood- 
worker; but  instead  of  "through,"  read  "for." 

"B told  me,"  said  Anton,  "that  his  book 

of  poetry  would  have  the  union  label  on  it. 
He  said  it  at  least  twelve  times.  If  he  knew 
what  I  think  of  him  he  wouldn't  say  it.  He 
claims  to  love  mankind,  but  he  is  an  awful 
sponger  on  the  radicals,  who  treat  him  as  a 
comrade.  He  works  them  in  return,  for  they 
all  think  him  great.  He  will  go  round  to 
the  houses  of  the  working  people,  eat  and 
sleep  with  them,  and  even  ask  for  things  that 
are  not  in  the  house.  He  takes  everything, 
and  gives  nothing.  Once  he  gave  a  blow-out, 
said  it  was  going  to  be  something  great. 
[282] 


An  Anarchist  Salon. 

When  we  got  there  we  found  sandwiches  and 
beer,  not  enough  of  that,  five  cents  worth. 
He  had  the  gall  to  hold  the  beer  up  to  the 
light,  to  show  us  how  good  it  was  I  He  thinks 
because  we  are  mechanics  he  can  treat  us  as 
he  likes. 

"He  goes  around  coolly  taking  the  wives 
and  comrades  of  other  men,  and  these  men  are 
often  grateful,  he  is  such  a  genius.  They  call 
him  the  King  of  the  Anarchists,  but  I  called 
him  the  Limit  in  Gall,  the  very  essence  of 
brass.  How  jealous  he  is,  too!  If  the 
women  show  any  interest  in  any  other  man, 
he  is  miserable.  If  he  were  a  better  man,  he 
would  be  a  better  poet,  I  believe,  though  I 
don't  know  much  about  that." 

Several  devoted  slaves  of  the  Poet,  besides 
the  factory  girl,  were  there;  one  man,  almost 
the  most  idealistic  and  enthusiastic  and  un- 
selfish personality  I  have  ever  met.  He  longs 
to  sacrifice  himself.  His  greatest  pleasure,  I 
believe,  would  be  to  be  put  into  prison  for 
the  sake  of  an  emotional  idea.  He  has  been, 
has  done,  everything;  has  worked  with  his 
hands,  in  a  book-store,  has  been  a  publisher; 
has  experienced  all  the  faiths;  when  a  Free 
Baptist,  he  was  arrested  for  preaching  on  a 
[283] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

soap-box  in  Chicago,  and  spent  a  night  in  jail. 
He  gives  to  all  he  can,  but  his  emotion  is 
stronger  by  far  than  his  intelligence,  which 
however  is  not  slight.  He  married  a  woman, 
loves  her  and  her  boy,  by  another  man ;  gives 
her  the  freedom  which  he  does  not  take  in  any 
essential  way.  The  result  finally  is  that  she 
now  loves  a  man  of  stronger,  more  selfish, 
more  brutal  character  than  her  poor  husband. 
There  is  no  need,  she  thinks,  to  care  for  the 
sensibilities  of  such  an  unselfish  man — fool, 
she  probably  thinks  him  in  her  heart.  And 
a  fool  he  is,  in  H's  sense  of  the  word,  but  he 
is  a  fool  now  who  is  miserable.  The  situa- 
tion is  tearing  his  heart  out,  but  it  is  against 
his  sense  of  justice  and  freedom  to  object.  So 
he  simply  suffers.  It  is  a  striking  case  of 
what  frequently  happens  in  this  "radical"  so- 
ciety. 

Men  and  women  try  frequently  because  of 
their  ideas  to  live  "tolerantly,"  as  they  call 
it,  but  they  too  often  find  that  their  "funda- 
mental emotions" — as  Marie  puts  it — are 
far  stronger  than  their  ideas.  And  then 
there  is  tragedy.  On  the  night  of  the  social, 
this  little  man  was  as  gay  as  a  lark.  Every- 
body likes  him  and  he  went  lightly  about, 
[284] 


An  Anarchist  Salon. 

dancing  and  making  himself  agreeable;  and 
drinking  more  than  was  good  for  him. 

He  has  a  practical  turn,  in  spite  of  his  ideal- 
ism ;  makes  more  money  than  any  of  the  other 
extreme  radicals.  Whenever  anything  is  to 
be  organized,  he  is  called  upon.  This  social 
was  for  the  benefit  of  one  of  the  two  anarchis- 
tic weeklies  in  Chicago — The  Demonstrator 
— "which  does  not  demonstrate,"  as  Anton 
put  it.  In  this  enterprise  the  little  man  is  an 
active  spirit.  He  is  active,  too,  in  making 
possible  the  weekly  meetings  of  the  radicals 
in  Masonic  Temple — called  the  Social  Sci- 
ence League.  He  was  active  in  securing  a 
room  in  that  building,  and  many  of  the  rad- 
icals bitterly  objected,  called  him  an  "aristo- 
crat." They  wanted  a  West  Side  garret  to 
meet  in,  thought  it  more  consistent  with  the 
cause  of  the  proletariat.  Many  of  the  more 
extreme  of  the  sect  refuse  to  attend  the  Sun- 
day night  meetings.  They  regard  the  whole 
thing  as  a  fake,  because  of  the  "swell"  sur- 
roundings. 

One  of  the  most  interesting  men  at  the  so- 
cial  was   like   Anton,    a   woodworker,    and 
worked  at  his  trade.     He,  again  like  Anton, 
had   more  fibre   and  calmness   and  strength 
[285] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

than  the  rank  and  file  of  the  anarchists.  He 
talks  well,  and  reasons,  not  emotionally,  but 
coolly;  and  in  character  he  is  balanced,  toler- 
ant and  kind.  He  is  a  learned  man  among 
them,  school-masterly  in  look,  and  talks  in  a 
slow,  deliberate  way.  His  character  has  not 
the  emphasis  and  vigor  of  that  of  Anton,  but 
it  is  steadfast  and  firm.  Jay  has  led  a  varied 
mechanic's  life — has  been  a  blacksmith  and  a 
carpenter,  as  well  as  a  woodworker.  He  is 
a  stow-a-way  from  Ireland,  but  has  apparently 
nothing  Irish  in  his  character.  At  one  time 
he  was  a  walking  delegate  in  New  York  and 
has  written  trades-union  and  anarchistic 
pamphlets.  His  anarchism  began  at  the  time 
of  the  Chicago  riots.  When  he  saw  the  bod- 
ies of  the  eight  anarchists  who  had  been 
hanged,  and  felt  the  "organized  injustice"  of 
the  act,  "something  happened"  to  him.  He 
was  deeply  moved,  and  he  has  felt  differently 
about  governments  ever  since. 

It  was  only  the  other  day  that  I  received 
a  letter  from  Jay.  I  had  written  him  that  I 
intended  to  speak  at  the  International  Con- 
gress of  Criminal  Anthropology  at  Turin,  and 
he  thereupon  wrote  me,  in  part,  as  follows : 

"I  must  comfess  I  am  greatly  at  a  loss  to 
[286] 


An  Anarchist  Salon. 

know  what  criminology  really  is.  It  does  not 
seem  to  me  there  is  anything  basic  in  it.  Are 
some  men  born  with  a  propensity  to  violate 
the  rules  of  the  game  of  society;  or  do  they 
acquire  the  habit  through  contact  with  their 
environment?  I  don't  think  heredity  has 
been  modified  in  the  least  by  society.  If  the 
postulates  of  evolutionary  science  are  correct 
it  took  countless  ages  for  man  to  reach  his 
present  state  of  development.  From  the 
standpoint  of  biology,  civilization  is  merely 
a  check  on  the  natural  instincts  of  man,  which 
lead  him  to  satisfy  his  desires  wherever  he 
can,  without  regard  to  conventions,  his  only 
question  being,  'Can  I  make  it  and  get  away?' 
"Every  man  is  born  a  criminal — born  with 
desires,  and  cares  only  that  they  be  satisfied. 
Heredity  says,  'Go  and  get  the  things  you  want 
wherever  you  see  them!'  Society  says :  'Hold 
on,  Bill,  I  have  made  rules  you  must  observe 
in  the  getting.'  It  is  quite  clear  the  only 
question  remains  as  to  whether  or  not  the  in- 
dividual will  observe  the  rules  is,  how  heavily 
do  the  rules  press  upon  him.  If  the  beaten 
path  of  civilization  is  level,  and  has  plenty  of 
eating-houses  along  the  way,  the  chances  are 
many  to  one  that  the  individual  will  be  a  'law- 
[287] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

abiding  citizen.'  But  if  the  path  is  paved 
with  cobblestones  and  there  is  a  policeman  at 
the  door  of  every  eating-house  who  forces  the 
weary  traveler  to  keep  moving,  and  refuses 
him  even  a  'hand-out,'  the  chances  are  strong 
that  he  will  wander  from  the  virtuous  path 
and  seek  his  bread  in  other  ways.  He  is 
caught,  clapped  into  jail,  and  the  criminolo- 
gist sees  at  once,  in  the  shape  of  his  ear,  of  his 
head,  or  what  not,  signs  that  tell  him  this 
man  has  criminal  propensities.  Of  course, 
the  criminologist  can  only  study  the  poor, 
half-witted  or  unfortunate  'criminal'  who  hap- 
pens to  get  caught,  and  he  prescribes  for  him. 
If  he  sees  in  him  a  propensity  to  murder  only, 
why,  get  him  a  job  in  a  slaughter  house 
— if  to  be  out  at  night,  make  a  night  watch- 
man out  of  him.  I  believe  crime  is  a  social 
disease,  and  should  be  treated  as  such.  If 
your  criminologist  will  go  and  study  the  en- 
vironment that  the  'criminal'  passed  through 
on  his  way  to  the  jail,  he  will  be  getting 
nearer  the  cause,  not  why  men  are  criminals, 
but  why  they  do  not  become  honest,  law-abid- 
ing citizens.  I  think  that  in  so  far  as  crimi- 
nology is  a  part  of  social  science,  it  is  of  much 
value  to  mankind,  but  if  it  is  pursued  as  a 
[288] 


An  Anarchist  Salon. 

study  of  individual  characteristics  and  pro- 
pensities, it  is  not  worth  any  more  than  the 
study  of  astrology  or  palmistry. 

"It  seems  to  me  the  whole  question  of  civi- 
lization is  one  of  environment  modifying  the 
natural  or  savage  instincts  of  mankind.  I  can 
not  see  how  anyone  not  a  believer  in  the  the- 
ory, or  rather  the  poem,  of  special  creation, 
can  take  issue  with  that  proposition.  If  this 
be  true  then  the  duty  of  the  true  friends  of 
Humanity  is  to  direct  their  energies  toward 
making  society  as  serviceable  as  possible  to 
the  individual;  that  he  may  be  compensated 
for  his  change  from  savagery,  and  be  con- 
verted into  a  true  friend  of  civilization.  Get 
your  criminologist  to  study  the  causes  that 
make  men  criminals,  and  you  will  have  done 
enough  for  any  one  man. 

"I  didn't  intend  to  say  but  a  few  words  on 
this  subject,  but  I  feel  deeply  at  the  way  the 
subject  is  being  handled  by  the  surface  philos- 
ophers and  wooden  scientists.  At  any  rate, 
since  you  are  going  to  the  conference,  the 
ideas  of  a  criminal  upon  criminals  may  not  be 
harmful  to  you.  Esther  is  busy  as  usual  ex- 
pounding that  which  is  in  her.  Her  soul  is 
filled  to  the  brim  with  the  joys  that  are  to 
[289] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

come  when  the  criminals  and  criminologists 
will  all  be  civilized." 

This  letter  is  a  good  example  of  the  kind 
of  speech  that  Jay  makes  at  the  Social  Sci- 
ence League,  or  at  other  "radical"  gatherings. 
He  is  of  the  better  and  sounder  type  of  the 
radical  agitator.  Anton  admires  and  respects 
him,  and  often  finds  him  a  job  at  his  trade, 
for  Jay  is  not  as  active  or  as  resourceful  as  his 
friend. 

Esther  is  what  Jay  calls  his  "companion." 
She  is  a  beautiful  Jewess,  and  was  present 
with  her  handsome  children  at  the  social. 
She  is  melancholy  and  affectionate  and  gentle 
and  sensual,  and  has  had  an  unhappy  experi- 
ence with  men.  She  left  her  husband  some 
years  ago,  "because  we  didn't  develop  to- 
gether." And  Jay  and  his  wife  separated  for 
the  same  reason.  Then  these  two  met,  and 
each  discovered  that  the  other  had  "high 
ideals." 

So  they  very  simply  began  to  live  to- 
gether. They  have  a  great  respect  for  one 
another,  and  Jay  is  so  tolerant  that  Esther's 
"longings"  are  completely  satisfied,  even  when 
they  lead  her  away  from  Jay  for  weeks  at  a 
time.  But  Jay's  soul  is  fortified  and  tested: 
[290] 


An  Anarchist  Salon. 

he  is  not  emotionally  vulnerable,  like  the  poor 
little  Free  Baptist  publisher. 

After  the  social  was  over,  the  "bunch"  went 
round  the  corner  to  a  chop-suey  joint,  and 
over  tea  and  the  conventional  Chinese  dish, 
we  talked  philosophy,  and  love,  and  psychol- 
ogy and  scandal  until  three  in  the  morning. 
Anton  and  Maggie,  Terry  and  Marie,  Jay 
and  Esther,  the  Poet  and  a  few  others,  and 
in  and  out  of  the  talk,  in  the  values  put  on 
life,  in  the  point  of  view,  in  the  prejudices, 
crudities,  enthusiasms  and  hopes  expressed, 
there  stalked,  in  the  incoherent  background, 
the  silent,  though  significant  figure  of  the 
Working  Man.  His  spirit  gave  meaning  to 
it  all. 

There  is  a  distinct,  though  rather  anaemic 
charm  about  these  gentle  anarchists — these 
proletarians  who  develop  a  consolatory  phi- 
losophy and  work  out  a  natural  and  intimate 
social  life.  In  one  of  his  books,  Anatole 
France  writes : 

"Last  week  an  anarchist  comrade  visited 
me.  I  love  him  because,  never  yet  having 
had  any  share  in  the  government  of  his  coun- 
try, he  has  preserved  much  of  his  innocence. 
[291] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

He  wants  to  upset  everything  only  because  he 
believes  men  naturally  good  and  virtuous. 
He  thinks  that,  freed  from  their  poverty, 
freed  from  their  laws,  they  would  get  rid  of 
their  egotism  and  their  wickedness." 


[292] 


CHAPTER  XIV. 
Politics  in  the  Federation, 

Anton  has  had  enough  share  in  the  govern- 
ment of  trades-unions,  in  the  workings  of  poli- 
tics and  in  the  passionate  clashes  of  ambitions, 
to  be  less  innocent  in  experience  than  the  an- 
archist friend  of  Anatole  France.  It  has  not 
taken  from  him  his  ideals,  but  it  serves  to 
make  him  very  different  from  his  anarchist 
associates.  He  is  a  man,  vigorous,  tolerant, 
passionate,  inconsistent,  generous,  hopeful, 
rough,  kind  and  gentle;  to  a  certain  degree 
practical  and  cognizant  of  conditions. 

Comparatively  recent  events  in  Chicago,  in 
v^hich  he  played  a  part,  have  served  to  make 
Anton  realize  that  facts  have  their  compul- 
siveness,  and  that  the  function  of  the  ideal  is 
often  only  that  of  a  tonic:  that  anarchism  is 
what  may  be  called  a  tonical  attitude  towards 
life,  an  emotional  cock-tail,  so  to  speak,  which 
serves  to  stimulate  one's  interest  in  ideal 
things  and  thus  exert,  on  the  whole,  a  useful 
[293] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

influence  in  reducing  the  unhumorous  serious- 
ness with  which  many  people,  given  up  to  rou- 
tine and  convention,  regard  the  fallible  insti- 
tutions of  men. 

Keen  as  Anton  is  to  see  the  limitations  of 
anarchism,  he  is  equally  keen  in  feeling  the 
weakness  of  a  merely  practical  movement  if 
it  is  not  allied  with  an  emotional  idealism.  A 
high-minded  and  useful  newspaper  man  of  my 
acquaintance,  one  who  has  worked  with  dis- 
tinction for  many  years  on  a  Chicago  paper 
and  has  written  every  week  comment  on  the 
labor  news  which  is  invaluable  to  all  students 
of  the  subject,  was  slugged  one  day,  after  at- 
tending a  meeting  of  the  Chicago  Federation 
of  Labor,  the  probable  cause  being  that  a  cer- 
tain corrupt  labor  politician  did  not  like  the 
impartial  and  critical  tone  of  the  writer. 
Commenting  on  this  occurrence,  Anton,  who 
is  a  friend  of  the  newspaper  man  and  respects 
his  honesty  and  ability,  said: 

"He  is  a  fine  fellow,  but  he  got  his  medi- 
cine. He  is  always  saying  that  there  must  not 
be  any  socialism  or  anarchism  in  the  move- 
ment, that  trades-unionism  methods,  and  they 
alone,  must  be  strictly  adhered  to,  and  of 
course  he  wants  trades-union  methods  without 
[294] 


Politics  in  the  Federation. 

graft  and  crookedness.  But  that  is  impossi- 
ble. You  can't  eliminate  graft  without  ideas, 
without  emotions,  and  there  are  no  more  emo- 
tions in  strictly  trade-union  politics  than  there 
are  in  politics  in  general.  There  are  no  ideas 
in  the  democratic  party  or  in  the  republican 
party,  and  there  are  no  ideas  among  the  prac- 
tical men  of  the  trade-unions  movement,  un- 
less those  ideas  are  put  into  it  by  the  emo- 
tional theorists,  as  they  are  called,  by  the  so- 
cialists and  the  anarchists." 

I  don't  think  this  quite  applies  to  the  news- 
paper man  referred  to,  but  it  serves  to  indi- 
cate Anton's  point  of  view.  That  newspaper 
writer  does  indeed  believe  in  the  need  of  prin- 
ciple, but  he  thinks  it  possible  that  merely 
moral  principle  is  sufficient  to  hold  men  along 
the  line  of  ideal  action.  In  connection  with 
the  fight  in  the  Federation  between  the  old 
"graft"  element  and  the  so-called  "reform" 
element,  the  newspaper  man  wrote  me,  as  fol- 
lows: 

"I  thought  of  you  last  Sunday  and  wished 
you  had  been  at  the  Federation  meeting  when 
the  election  of  officers  was  stopped  by  rowdy- 
ism for  the  second  time.  It  was  a  sight  that 
you  would  never  forget.  Another  effort  will 
[295] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

be  made  to-morrow  to  elect  officers;  whether 
it  will  be  successful  remains  to  be  seen.  In 
any  event,  it  is  a  hopeful  sign  that  we  are  able 
to  make  such  fights  for  what  we  conceive  to 
be  honest  and  right.  As  long  as  men  are 
ready  and  willing  to  put  up  a  fight  against 
wrong  and  injustice,  I  say  it  is  a  hopeful  sign 
whether  successful  or  not.  That  seems  to  be 
the  situation  in  the  Federation.  Personally 
I  like  Madden  (the  machine  politician  who 
has  dictated  officers  to  the  Federation  for 
years)  better  than  Dold,  but  as  I  told  Madden 
yesterday,  I  am  looking  to  underlying  prin- 
ciples, not  to  the  individuals.  I  wish  the  so- 
called  reform  element  had  a  stronger  man  to 
lead  than  Dold,  for  the  meeting  last  Sunday 
was  the  best  illustration  I  ever  saw  that  men 
want  to  be  led.  It  was  really  a  sight  to  see 
a  big  crowd  of  men  racked  and  torn  with  pas- 
sion becoming  calm  the  moment  Madden 
lifted  his  finger,  and  again  when  he  gave  the 
signal,  they  simply  raised  hell.  Much  as  I 
disagree  with  Madden's  methods,  I  could  not 
help  admiring  the  man  during  the  fight. 
Cool  and  smiling  he  simply  swayed  his  crowd 
as  he  pleased,  while  Dold  was  hesitating  and 
trembling  from  physical  fear." 
[296] 


Politics  in  the  Federation. 

Sentiments  such  as  these  this  reporter  put 
in  his  paper  and  probably  in  consequence  of 
this  general  attitude,  he  was  at  a  considerably- 
later  time  slugged.  It  was  during  these  po- 
litical fights,  when  Madden  took  around  with 
him  his  ruffians  prepared  to  use  physical  vio- 
lence, that  Michael  Donnelly,  the  leader  in 
the  great  stock-yards  strike,  was  beaten  for 
the  second  time,  and  almost  killed.  His  first 
slugging  was  due,  it  is  believed,  to  his  attitude 
of  hostility  towards  the  DriscoU-Young  ma- 
chine which  controlled  the  teamsters  for  so 
long,  and  was  finally  condemned  by  the  re- 
formers in  the  Labor  Federation.  Don- 
nelly brought  in  a  resolution  severely  con- 
demning Driscoll,  and  it  was  soon  after  this 
that  he  was  slugged  and  nearly  killed.  And 
the  second  time,  it  happened  probably  for  very 
much  the  same  general  reasons — a  simple- 
hearted  and  courageous  opposition  to  the  cor- 
rupt but  powerful  labor  machine.  This  was 
also  why  the  high-minded  reporter  I  have  re- 
ferred to,  Luke  Grant,  "got  his  medicine." 

Grant  is  a  shrewd  Scotchman,  honest  and 

clear,   whose   heart  is   thoroughly  with   the 

labor   movement,    but   who   puts   the    usual 

amount  of  respectable  emphasis  on  the  unde- 

[297] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

sirability  of  violence  and  "graft."  During 
one  of  the  teamsters'  riots,  the  extent  of  which 
was  grossly  exaggerated,  I  was  with  Grant 
and  another  Chicago  newspaper  man;  when 
Grant  admitted  that  he  had  a  strong  desire  to 
throw  rocks  at  the  "scab"  drivers.  "I  don't  be- 
lieve in  doing  it,"  he  said,  "and  think  it  is  all 
wrong,  but  yet  instinctively  I  would  like  to." 
The  other  reporter  remarked  that  Grant's 
words  were  an  expression  of  the  "neighbor- 
hood morality,"  the  behests  of  which  were 
often  stronger  than  law. 

And  yet  Grant,  in  spite  of  his  strong  sym- 
pathy with  the  cause,  is  deeply  affected  by  the 
opinion  of  the  settlement  workers  and  of  the 
better  element" — such  as  Grahame  Taylor 
and  other  good  men — which  lays  stress  upon 
the  undesirability  of  violence  and  graft — 
which  maintains  vehemently  that  bad  is  bad 
and  good  is  good.  It  is  partly  this  kind  of 
emphasis  which  gives  rise  to  a  misapprehen- 
sion of  the  relative  values  of  the  whole  situa- 
tion. The  wave  of  "reform"  which  has  swept 
America  for  the  last  few  years  has  no  doubt 
done  lasting  good,  but  it  has  undoubtedly  in 
many  cases  turned  one's  eyes  away  from  the 
forest  and  riveted  them  on  the  trees.  And 
[298] 


Politics  in  the  Federation. 

this  is  particularly  true  of  the  labor  situation, 
especially  of  the  distressing  events  connected 
with  the  great  teamsters'  strike  in  Chicago 
which  aroused  and  excited  the  whole  country. 
The  eddies  on  the  surface — "graft"  and  vio- 
lence— have  been  magnified  into  waves  of 
greater  volume  than  the  mass,  while  the  big, 
underlying  and  significant  facts  of  the  human 
situation  have  not  always  been  present  in 
the  critical  consciousness.  Grant  was  near 
enough  the  particular  situation  to  see  points 
of  corruption  among  the  labor  leaders  as  well 
as  among  the  employers,  and,  naturally 
enough,  on  account  of  his  proximity,  he  some- 
times was  in  a  mood  to  exaggerate  the  im- 
portance of  these  unpleasant  facts.  Journal- 
ism is  more  insistent  than  literature.  It  deals 
with  the  temporary,  salient  accidents,  and 
neglects  the  big  underlying  volume  of  life ;  so 
in  the  contemporary  treatment,  in  newspapers 
and  books,  even  when  they  are  honest  and  un- 
prejudiced, of  the  labor  situation,  there  has 
been  a  harping  on  the  exceptional  situation — 
upon  the  dishonest  labor  official,  the  unjust 
strike,  the  walking  delegate's  arrogance,  the 
"educational  committee"  and  its  violence. 
All  these  things,  to  be  sure,  are  undesirable, 
[299] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor* 

but  it  is  still  more  undesirable  to  allow  one's 
sympathy,  because  of  these  things,  to  fall  away 
from  a  movement  which  contains  more  eth- 
ics, humanity  and  justice  than^any  other  move- 
ment of  our  day. 

When  I  first  went  to  Chicago  and  was 
slugged  in  a  saloon  because  I  called  Sam 
Parks  a  thief,  I  was  in  a  state  of  mind  in 
which  I  too  believed  financial  dishonesty 
and  ethical  bad  taste  generally  were  matters 
of  the  very  greatest  human  importance.  I 
still  think  it  is  bad  to  steal,  but  I  now  believe 
that  a  man  who  steals  may  still  be  of  human 
importance,  and  that  the  bulk  of  his  activity 
may  be  for  good.  I  have  heard  many  very 
fine  laboring  men,  who  would  not  steal  a 
penny,  defend  Sam  Parks  and  men  like  him, 
on  the  ground  that  these  men  were  really  de- 
voted to  the  cause  and  had  done  good  work 
and  were  full  of  the  milk  of  human  kindness ; 
better  men  than  many  of  "our  best  citizens" 
who  obey  the  law  but  who  are  humanly  un- 
just. 

The  workingmen  believe,  of  course  that 
much  of  present  day  law,  as  it  concerns  prop- 
erty, is  meant  for  one  class  only,  and  they 
naturally  do  not  feel  the  same  hatred  for  an 
[300] 


Politics  in  the  Federation. 

ordinary  thief  as  they  do  for  a  sheltered  or 
extraordinary  one. 

It  was  a  feeling  very  similar  to  that  I  have 
expressed  which  determined  Anton's  general 
feeling  towards  the  grafting  machine  on  the 
one  hand,  and  the  reformers  in  the  Federa- 
tion, on  the  other. 

"At  one  stage  of  the  fight  against  the  Mad- 
den machine,"  he  said,  "the  reformers  invited 
me  to  attend  their  caucus.  They  knew  that  I 
had  always  been  against  the  machine,  and  that 
I  had  a  strong  following  among  the  wood- 
workers. These  so-called  purifiers  were  out 
to  defeat  the  Madden  slate,  but  had  not  rec- 
ommended anybody  for  President  as  against 
Madden's  man,  Schardt.  I  suggested  the 
name  of  a  revolutionary  Socialist  who  was 
Madden's  chief  opponent.  They  rejected 
him  as  their  candidate  partly  on  the  ground 
that  if  he  were  elected,  it  would  go  out  that 
it  was  a  Socialist  election.  This  seemed  to  me 
an  unjust  and  nonsensical  reason,  although  I 
was  not  a  Socialist,  but  when  they  went  further 
and  said  that  if  he  were  elected,  they  would 
not  be  recognized  on  the  committees,  they 
seemed  to  me  to  be  quite  as  small  as  the  so- 

[301] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

called  grafters,  and  I  told  them  to  go  to  hell, 
as  quietly  as  I  could. 

"I  consented,  however,  to  watch  for  them 
when  the  ballots  were  counted.  When  the 
polls  opened,  the  judges  and  clerks,  who  were 
Madden  men,  ruled  that  we  had  no  right  to 
have  watchers,  but  about  10:30  Schardt,  Mad- 
den's  candidate,  came  around,  and  admitted 
the  watchers.  By  that  time,  the  ballots  could 
easily  have  been  fixed.  One  of  the  judges 
was  a  prize-fighter,  one  a  bar-tender,  two 
were  sluggers,  and  all  were  Madden  men.  But 
I  took  a  chance,  and  decided  to  watch.  I  was 
told  that  the  ballots  could  not  all  be  counted 
till  four  or  five  o'clock  in  the  morning.  I 
thought  this  was  intended  to  discourage  me, 
and  I  was  more  determined  than  ever.  If  I 
had  known  what  I  know  now,  I  wouldn't  have 
taken  such  an  awful  risk.  When  I  entered, 
I  made  a  statement  to  the  judges  and  clerks, 
for  I  realized  that  these  men  hated  the  two 
men  who  had  asked  me  to  watch — for  these 
two  men  had  been  the  most  stubborn  oppo- 
nents of  ring  rule. 

"  The  fact  that  I  am  a  watcher,'  I  said, 
'need  not  be  taken  necessarily  as  an  indica- 
tion that  I  suspect  the  honesty  of  the  judges 
[302] 


Politics  in  the  Federation. 

and  clerks.  I  disagree  with  both  of  these  re- 
formers in  many  respects,  but  in  view  of  the 
rumors  that  have  been  circulated  in  trade- 
union  circles  that  there  is  no  such  thing  as  an 
honest  election  in  the  Chicago  Federation  of 
Labor,  I  want  to  learn  for  myself  as  well  as 
for  the  men  I  represent,  to  what  extent  this 
is  true  or  false.'  I  took  a  position  behind  the 
man  who  read  off  the  ballot  to  be  sure 
that  the  names  he  read  had  a  cross  before 
them. 

I  had  had  no  food  since  breakfast,  but  the 
judges  and  clerks  had  all  kinds  of  lunch  and 
drinks  ordered  at  the  expense  of  the  Federa- 
tion, which  was  illegal.  They  asked  me  to 
join  with  them,  but  I  drank  very  little,  as  I 
was  very  suspicious  of  their  motives.  After 
the  lunch,  one  of  the  judges  pulled  out  a  big 
pistol  and  asked  me  to  hold  it  for  him  while 
he  went  down  stairs.  Another  judge  laid  his 
revolver  on  the  table  where  I  could  see  it.  I 
thought  all  this  play  was  meant  for  me,  and 
I  felt  I  was  up  against  it.  Skinny  Madden 
came  in  just  then.  Everybody  knows  him  as 
the  Lorimer  of  the  Federation.  I  quietly  but 
persistently  asked  the  judges  if  Skinny  had 
credentials  admitting  him  to  the  counting. 
[  303  ] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

He  overheard  me,  replied  that  he  had  no  cre- 
dentials, and  left. 

"They  went  on  counting  the  votes.  I  no- 
ticed that  the  first  five  names  of  the  candi- 
dates for  the  executive  board  received  two  or 
three  hundred  ballots  all  marked  alike.  It 
was  a  cunning  scheme,  as  it  meant,  'Vote  for 
the  first  five,'  and  would  avoid  the  possibility 
of  confusing  names,  and  would  make  stuffing 
ballots  easy.  About  2  a.  m.  six  hundred  and 
fifty  ballots  had  been  counted,  and  the  entire 
machine  had  been  elected.  There  was  no 
longer  any  need  for  me  to  stay;  the  judges 
and  clerks  wanted  to  know  what  my  attitude 
would  be  in  the  Federation.  I  replied  that 
I  would  stand  by  the  facts  whatever  they 
were. 

"At  the  next  meeting  of  the  Federation,  the 
report  of  the  election  was  given,  and  no  pro- 
test was  made  by  anybody.  The  men  for 
whom  I  had  watched,  did  not  ask  me  to  re- 
port, but  one  of  them  got  up  and  read  a  letter 
from  his  union  charging  dishonesty  and  cor- 
ruption in  the  election  but  not  giving  an 
iota  of  evidence..  I  deemed  it  an  insult  to 
me  that,  after  watching  all  day  and  all  night, 
my  opinion  had  not  been  asked,  so  I  took  the 
[304] 


Politics  in  the  Federation. 

floor  and  roasted  the  union  for  making  an  un- 
substantiated charge,  and  the  ^purifiers'  for 
their  cowardice.  'I  have  no  doubt,'  I  said, 
'that  Madden  is  the  Lorimer  of  the  Federa- 
tion, but  my  observation  has  taught  me  that 
the  main  reason  the  reformers  are  dissatisfied 
is  that  they  themselves  are  not  the  Lorimers 
of  the  Federation.  I  personally  and  also  as 
a  member  of  my  union  am  opposed  to  gang 
rule  wherever  I  see  it,  no  matter  what  flag 
it  flies  under  in  the  Federation,  but  I  am  not 
willing  to  make  a  serious  charge  without  some 
definite  evidence.  I  am  opposed  to  many  of 
those  who  have  been  elected,  and  especially  to 
the  President,  but  although  I  watched  all 
day  and  all  night,  I  saw  nothing  that  I 
could  advance  as  evidence  of  corruption.  It 
looks  to  me  as  if  the  man  for  whom  I  watched 
suspected  my  honesty,  as  he  did  not  ask  me 
my  opinion,  but  preferred  to  present  unsub- 
stantiated charges.  I  voted  for  him,  but  if 
he  has  no  better  judgment  than  to  appoint  a 
man  whom  he  immediately  afterwards  sus- 
pects of  dishonesty,  I  am  glad  he  is  defeated.' 
"This  speech  created  a  sensation  in  the 
Federation  meeting.  Some  of  the  Socialists 
thought  I  did  not  stand  by  them,  right  or 
[305] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

wrong,  but  I  am  not  a  'class-conscious'  man, 
and  don't  care  for  that  kind  of  sentiment. 
They  hinted  I  had  not  done  right.  I  told 
them  that  if  the  facts  would  hurt  the  reform 
movement,  the  reform  movement  ought  to  be 
reformed.  v 

"Madden's  man,  Schardt,  when  elected  Pres- 
ident, came  to  me  and  asked  me  to  serve  on 
the  resolutions  committee.  He  said  I  was  a 
fair-fighter,  but  began  to  tell  me  what  to  do 
when  I  was  on  the  committee.  I  checked  him 
and  told  him  I  had  a  mind  of  my  own,  and, 
if  on  the  committee,  I  would  act  as  I  pleased, 
r  would  work  only  as  a  free  lance,  I  said. 
He  seemed  to  think  that  because  I  had  not 
charged  his  gang  with  dishonesty  I  couldn't 
prove  that  I  was  for  them.  Needless  to  say, 
I  was  not  appointed  to  the  committee. 

"These  little  oppositions  of  mine  did  not 
amount  to  much,  but  I  kept  them  all  worried. 
They  did  not  know  where  I  stood.  They  did 
not  seem  to  grasp  the  idea  of  being  independ- 
ent even  from  reform.  My  popularity  among 
the  rank  and  file  increased.  At  every  elec- 
tion several  would  nominate  me  for  some 
office  in  the  Federation,  but  I  always  de- 
clined ;  because,  working  at  my  trade,  I  could 
[306] 


Politics  in  the  Federation. 

not  attend  the  committees  regularly,  and  so 
would  not  be  in  so  good  a  position  to  criticize. 
Then,  too,  a  free  lance  is  always  in  a  good 
position  to  talk,  for  men  know  he  is  not  trying 
to  get  anything.  As  it  was,  I  was  the  only 
man  in  the  Federation  who  was  always  on  the 
floor  to  fight  anything  that  came  from  the  ad- 
ministration that  seemed  to  me  wrong.  The 
terrible  fear  of  advocating  a  measure  which 
was  likely  to  be  defeated  keeps  many  men  in 
their  seats,  but  I  like  nothing  better  than  to 
be  in  the  minority.  When  you  are  right,  it  is 
very  exciting.  I  dislike  those  'reformers'  who 
sit  by  and  see  a  tyrannical  thing  done,  by  the 
gavel  or  otherwise,  without  protesting. 

"As  time  went  on,  the  reformers  found  it 
more  and  more  difficult  to  understand  my  at- 
titude. When  the  fight  came  up  between 
Madden  and  Dold  and  the  former's  bullies 
made  their  raids  on  the  ballots,  men  like 
Quinn  and  Fitzpatrick  did  not  understand 
my  lukewarm  stand,  unless  I  had  gone  over 
to  the  Madden  camp.  As  I  had  always 
fought  the  Madden  machine  this  looked  to 
them  like  treachery.  I  could  not  be  enthusi- 
astic for  a  man  like  Dold,  and  I  didn't  like 
the  cowardly  and  tyrannical  attitude  of  the 
[307] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

reform  machine ;  and  I  didn't  like  their  tend- 
ency to  put  their  friends  in  office.  If,  being 
against  a  machine  makes  a  purifier,  I  am  the 
only  purifier  in  the  Federation." 

Charles  Dold  was  originally  put  in  office  by 
the  Madden  machine ;  and  I  have  it  from  no 
less  an  authority  than  Samuel  Gompers  that 
Dold  made  Madden  a  promise  not  to  put  a 
certain  vigorous  revolutionary  Socialist,  a  "re- 
former," on  any  committee.  But  Dold  fell 
into  the  hands  of  the  "better  element"  in  and 
out  of  labor  circles  and  the  result  was  that  he 
put  this  man,  obnoxious  to  Madden,  on  sev- 
eral important  committees.  Madden,  there- 
fore, got  out  his  knife  and  determined  by  all 
legal  and  illegal  methods  to  defeat  Dold  at 
the  next  election. 

"When,"  continued  Anton,  "this  election 
was  to  be  held,  the  Federation  was  divided 
into  two  camps,  the  Dold  faction  and  the 
Madden  faction.  The  slugging  of  Donnelly 
drew  the  lines  all  the  sharper,  and  naturally 
everybody  would  be  against  Madden.  But 
the  Woodworkers'  delegates  had  reason  to 
oppose  Dold.  He  had  been  fighting  our  or- 
ganization for  a  long  time,  and  was  in  addi- 
tion a  disagreeable  side-stepper  who  liked  to 
[308] 


Politics  in  the  Federation. 

avoid  responsibility  and  had  no  personal  cour- 
age. Knowing  that  he  would  not  go  very  far 
in  defending  principle,  when  by  so  doing  he 
might  be  violently  dealt  with,  neither  I  nor 
any  other  woodworker  was  willing  to  make  a 
strong  fight  for  him.  In  addition,  the  wood- 
workers were  on  strike  at  the  time,  and  needed 
the  support  of  all  the  Unions  regardless  of 
political  factions.  So  we  did  not  hump  our- 
selves for  the  "reform"  candidate. 

"The  element  of  so-called  purifiers  who  had 
suddenly  waked  up  to  the  necessity  of  fighting 
the  machine,  took  for  granted,  as  I  have  said, 
that  I  was  a  Madden  man  looking  for  favors. 
They  lost  sight  of  the  fact  that  neither  I  nor 
any  other  woodworker  had  ever  occupied  any 
conspicuous  official  position  in  the  Federation, 
with  the  exception  of  Dick  Braunsweig,  who 
some  years  ago  was  a  member  of  the  executive 
board,  and  was  a  most  vigorous  fighter  against 
gang  rule.  Dold  at  that  time  was  recognized 
as  the  most  valuable  supporter  of  machine 
rule ;  and  is  quite  generally  regarded  in  labor 
circles  as  a  man  not  to  be  relied  on  too 
strongly. 

"Experience  taught  me  that,  if  I  wanted 
to  be  a  factor  for  good  in  the  Woodworkers' 
[309] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

organization  and  the  labor  movement  in  gen- 
eral, I  must  be  careful  not  to  recommend  a 
man  who  I  felt  would  disappoint  the  ex- 
pectations of  the  men  behind  him,  no  matter 
what  principle  he  named  as  a  party  measure. 
I  questioned  the  wisdom  of  stating  with 
fevered  enthusiasm  that  the  election  of  any 
man  to  any  office  would  assure  any  particu- 
lar relief  to  the  rank  and  file.  I  feared  that 
to  be  very  enthusiastic  about  the  greatness  or 
goodness  of  any  man  would  divert  the  at- 
tention of  the  rank  and  file  from  the  necessity 
of  looking  after  themselves  and  of  being 
active  from  time  to  time.  These  were  my 
reasons  for  not  coming  out  strongly  for 
Dold. 

"On  the  other  hand,  I  knew  that  the  Mad- 
den element  was  certainly  not  what  was 
wanted  in  the  labor  movement.  So  I  was 
forced  to  take  a  neutral  position.  My  an- 
archism, or  in  other  words  my  tolerance  and 
the  many-sided  influence  of  my  radical 
friends,  made  it  easier  for  me  to  take  such  a 
position,  for  I  had  no  great  confidence  that 
anything  very  good  could  come  out  of  politi- 
cal fights  where  the  factions  were  looking  for 
advantage;  or  out  of  machinery  in  general. 
[310] 


Politics  in  the  Federation. 

Great  good  only  comes  in  my  opinion  from 
the  educations  of  life. 

"A  little  while  before  the  slugging  of  Don- 
nelly and  the  election  I  had  made  up  my  mind 
that  I  wanted  to  be  Chicago  delegate  to  the 
International  Labor  Congress  which  was  to 
meet  at  Pittsburg  in  November  of  last  year. 
I  could  get  off  three  weeks  from  my  job  in  the 
factory,  and  representing  the  big  labor  body 
in  Chicago  I  would  have  a  chance  to  express 
my  views  on  the  larger  issues  of  labor  and 
meet  men  prominent  in  the  movement  all  over 
the  world.  It  had  been  the  custom  for  the 
President  of  the  Chicago  Federation  to  be  the 
delegate  to  the  National  and  International 
Congresses,  if  he  desired  to  be.  I  had,  pre- 
vious to  the  local  election,  approached  the 
Secretary  of  the  Federation  and  ascertained 
that  there  would  be  no  opposition  to  my  can- 
didacy either  from  him  or  from  President 
Dold,  who  did  not  desire  to  be  the  Chicago 
delegate. 

"When  the  time  for  the  election  of  the  dele- 
gate approached,  I  found,  on  account  of  my 
luke-warm  support  of  Dold  in  the  local  elec- 
tions, that  the  'reformers'  were  against  me,  sus- 
pecting me  to  be  a  Madden  man,  as  I  have 
[311] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

explained.  They  all  got  busy  in  an  effort  to 
defeat  me.  They  knew  that  I  was  better 
cjualified  than  the  man  who  ran  against  me, 
but  I  would  not  work  in  favor  of  their  hob- 
bies. That  shows  the  paradox  of  their  posi- 
tion as  reformers.  The  Secretary  of  the  Fed- 
eration came  to  me,  through  their  influence, 
and  asked  me  to  withdraw.  'I'm  afraid  they 
have  got  you  beat,'  he  said.  'You  can  go  and 
tell  the  caucus  of  reformers  to  go  to  hell,'  I 
said,  *I  am  in  this  fight  to  stay.' 

"I  determined  to  beat  this  gang,  if  I  could, 
and  for  the  first  time  I  decided  to  hustle 
for  my  election,  and  play  a  few  cards.  The 
next  Monday  a  convention  of  street  car  work- 
ers opened,  and  I  as  President  of  the  Wood- 
workers had  received  an  invitation  to  present 
to  this  convention  a  gavel  bearing  a  Union 
label.  The  street-car  men  have  the  largest 
delegation  to  the  Chicago  Federation  of  La- 
bor, and  all  their  strong  men  were  at  this  con- 
vention. That  gave  me  an  opportunity  to  tell 
them  where  I  stood.  I  explained  to  them  the 
situation,  and  they  promised  to  stand  by  me 
in  the  election.  That  same  night  I  told  my 
story  before  my  own  Union.  I  had  been  in- 
strumental in  obtaining  $2,000  from  the  Fed- 
[312J 


Politics  in  the  Federation. 

eration  for  the  Woodworkers  while  on  strike, 
and  was  generally  popular  in  my  Union,  and 
they  elected  four  additional  delegates.  An- 
other Woodworkers'  Union,  No.  67,  elected 
five  additional  delegates  and  No.  17  six. 
Every  Union  instructed  their  delegates  to  be 
present  at  the  Federation  meeting  when  the 
delegate  for  the  Pittsburg  Convention  was  to 
be  elected.  There  never  was  a  time  when  any 
one  organization  was  so  united  and  deter- 
mined in  any  particular  purpose,  as  they  were 
on  electing  me. 

"Every  Woodworker  delegate  showed  up  at 
the  election.  The  opposition  got  very  uneasy 
when  they  saw  how  strong  I  was  in  my  own 
Union;  and  adopted  the  old  machine  tyrant 
rule  of  electing  the  delegate  by  motion.  It 
was  moved  that,  since  the  President  was  not 
present,  that  the  Vice-President  of  the  Federa- 
tion be  appointed  delegate  to  the  Pittsburg 
Convention.  I  immediately  jumped  to  my 
feet  and  protested  against  the  autocratic  man- 
ner of  selecting  the  delegate.  Others  rose  to 
their  feet  and  joined  in  my  protest,  moving 
that  the  proper  way  to  elect  the  delegate  was 
by  secret  ballot.  The  purifiers  could  not  ob- 
ject to  this,  and  nominations  were  made.  An 
[313] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

old  carpenter  arose  and  nominated  Steve  Sum- 
ner, a  teamster,  a  lily-white  reformer,  on  the 
water  wagon  and  very  religious,  but  only  a 
two-year-old  trade-unionist.  The  financial 
secretary  Hopp  then  put  me  in  nomination. 
Tim  Quinn  and  John  Fitzpatrick,  two  stellar 
lights  in  the  reforming  caucus,  had  been  nomi- 
nated. They  got  up  and  declined  in  favor 
of  Sumner.  It  was,  of  course,  a  put-up  game 
to  defeat  me.  Quinn  spoke  of  the  courage 
and  honesty  of  one  of  the  men  already  nomi- 
nated, and  heartily  recommended  Sumner  to 
the  Federation.  Fitzpatrick  in  his  speech  of 
declination,  emphasized  the  fact  that  Sumner 
was  on  the  water  wagon  and  therefore  should 
be  elected.  A  Socialist  who  had  been  put  in 
nomination  also  declined  in  favor  of  Sum- 
ner 'who  was  a  pure  and  simple  trades- 
unionist.' 

"I  got  up  and  demanded  that  my  gray- 
haired  friend  inform  the  Federation  whether 
any  one  of  the  candidates  was  not  a  trades- 
unionist,  and  if  so,  to  point  him  out.  Pre- 
viously to  the  balloting,  there  was  much  talk 
among  the  delegates,  and  the  sentiment  against 
the  caucus  methods  was  strong.  'Vote  against 
the  caucus,'  I  heard  said  everywhere  among 
[314] 


Politics  in  the  Federation, 

the  men.  The  woodworkers  and  the  street- 
car men  were  with  me ;  but  they  were  less  than 
half  of  my  supporters.  All  the  ladies  were 
for  me;  those  representing  the  Teachers' 
Union  and  the  Waitresses,  whom  I  used  to 
escort  home.  Many  teamsters  voted  for  me 
because  the  other  fellow  was  on  the  water 
wagon.  The  vote  was  taken,  and  I  was 
elected,  90  to  67.  There  was  great  applause, 
and  I  was  called  on  for  a  speech.  That  was 
my  opportunity,  and  I  said,  *I  am  extremely 
pleased  that  the  chairman  possesses  the  won- 
derful courage  to  abide  by  the  decision  of  the 
majority.  I  am  sure  he  would  have  liked  to 
do  otherwise,  and  if  my  sympathy  was  of  any 
use  to  him,  he  might  have  it  and  I  would  be 
satisfied  with  the  votes.  As  for  those  who 
have  strenuously  defended  the  slate  and  done 
all  they  could  to  prevent  it  breaking,  I  can 
assure  them  that  it  is  sometimes  quite  as  neces- 
sary to  break  a  slate  that  comes  from  the  Ma- 
sonic Temple  as  to  break  a  slate  that  comes 
from  the  back-room  of  a  saloon.  I  trust  that 
no  one  will  misunderstand  the  utterances  of 
that  ungodly  man  when  he  resigned  in  favor 
of  our  Christian  friend,  for  I  am  sure  it  was 
not  inspired  by  personal  selfishness  but  merely 
[315] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

by  the  passion  he  had  to  submit  to  the  ty- 
ranny of  a  caucus.  While  I  sympathize  with 
the  error  of  their  ways,  I  cannot  accept  their 
philosophy,  and  for  those  who  may  have  mis- 
understood the  reformer  when  he  spoke  of 
the  water  wagon,  I  wish  to  inform  the  Fed- 
eration that  it  is  true  I  have  never  been  on 
the  water  wagon,  but  I  think  that  may  be  be- 
cause I  have  never  been  on  the  whiskey  wagon. 
As  for  those  men  who  have  spoken  so  feelingly 
about  purity  and  simplicity,  I  assure  the  Fed- 
eration that  I  can  see  the  simplicity  of  their 
motives,  but  I'll  be  damned  if  I  can  see  the 
purity. 

"  *I  can  assure  the  Federation,'  I  concluded, 
'that  my  attitude  in  the  International  Labor 
Convention  will  be  just  as  conscientious  as  it 
has  always  been  in  the  Chicago  Federation  of 
Labor.  I  remember  a  year  ago  that  the  dele- 
gate representing  the  Federation  was  allowed 
$500  to  attend  the  Convention.  I  hope  in 
my  case  $7  a  day  and  car  fare  will  be  suffi- 
cient to  cover  the  expenses  and  permit  me  to 
be  a  gentleman.  I  am  at  a  loss  to  understand 
why  $500  can  make  a  gentleman  out  of  a  man 
any  more  easily  than  $150,  but  perhaps  the 
caucus  people  who  kept  silent  a  year  ago  can 
[316] 


Politics  in  the  Federation. 

explain  this  point  to  the  satisfaction  of  the 
Federation.' 

"After  I  had  finished,  the  applause  came 
like  thunder,  very  much  to  the  disheartening 
of  the  caucus  people.  After  all  their  efforts 
I  had  defeated  them  by  a  large  majority. 
They  came  around  and  were  very  mild  and 
apologetic.  I  told  Fitzpatrick  I  was  sorry 
he  was  the  caucus  candidate  for  President, 
but,  although  he  had  behind  closed  doors  in 
the  caucus  conspired  to  defeat  me  as  delegate 
and  had  shown  his  willingness  to  eulogize  a 
two-year-old,  yet  I  was  not  too  small  to  over- 
look that  weakness  and  vote  for  him  as  Presi- 
dent. *I  don't  want  you  to  think,  however,' 
I  said,  'that  I  believe  in  caucuses  to  elect  offi- 
cers. I  have  no  objection  to  their  being 
called  for  the  purpose  of  solidifying  the 
ranks  in  a  common  attitude  against  the  com- 
mon enemy,  but  when  it  comes  to  elect  officers, 
I  think  a  man's  character  should  be  suffi- 
ciently open  for  us  to  judge  as  to  his  fitness, 
without  a  caucus.  I  don't  want  you  to  feel 
that  I  am  pledging  you  my  vote,  as  I  can't 
tell  but  what  a  better  man  may  come  up  be- 
fore the  election,  for  instance,  myself.'  He 
laughed  at  that,  and  we  were  friendly." 
[317] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

In  connection  with  the  general  subject  of 
politics  within  the  body  of  organized  labor, 
the  attitude  of  Samuel  Gompers,  President  of 
the  American  Federation  of  Labor,  towards 
this  Dold-Madden  fight,  is  interesting. 
When  the  fight  had  become  acute,  Dold,  Fitz- 
patrick  and  others  of  the  reformers  appealed 
to  Gompers  to  use  his  good  offices  to  try  to 
bring  about  peace  between  the  warring  fac- 
tions. Gompers  characteristically  delegated 
the  power  which  he  had  by  reason  of  the  in- 
vitation to  Thomas  I.  Kidd,  an  executive  offi- 
cer of  the  American  Federation  of  Labor,  the 
most  prominent  woodworker,  and  a  man 
whose  high  character  is  recognized  by  every- 
body. Mr.  Kidd  heard  both  sides;  in  the 
caucus  of  Dold's  friends  it  was  agreed  that 
Mr.  Kidd  should  preside  in  the  Federation 
and  his  decision  be  accepted  as  final.  Anton, 
telling  the  story,  said : 

"When   B (the   anarchist  woodworker 

agitator  who  has  been  referred  to  earlier  in 
Anton's  story)  heard  of  this,  he  threw  up  his 
hands,  and  said  to  me  and  Tom  Kidd:  'O, 
Jesus,  I  knew  dot  when  Foxy  Sam  Gompers, 
when  he  got  invitation  to  come  to  give  one 
advice  in  fight  of  labor  against  capital,  he 
[318] 


Politics  in  the  Federation. 

come  right  away,  but  wen  he  be  asked  to 
come  to  settle  a  fight  between  one  man  and 
anodder  in  a  Union  den  he  can't  come,  den 
he  got  no  time.  Gompers  ain't  no  damn  fool 
like  you,  Dom  Kidd.  No  matter  how  you  de- 
cide, no  matter  how  fair  you  be  one  way  or 
de  odder,  dey  won't  like  'em.  You  got  no 
right  as  executive  officer  of  the  Amalgamated 
Woodworkers  to  act  in  dat  capacity.  You 
make  enemies  when  de  woodworkers  have  to 
make  good.  Denn,  too,  you  won't  get  no 
hearing.  Do  you  dink  dot  Skinny  Madden 
allow  you  to  be  umpire  wen  he  don't  know  you 
are  wid  him?  Not  on  your  life!  And  Skin- 
ny Madden  knows,  and  Charley  Dold  knows 
dat  Dom  Kidd  has  no  use  for  Charley  Dold, 
and  has  no  right  to  have  any  use  for  Charley 
Dold,  but  don't  need  to  make  any  publicity 
of  it.  But  you  accept  and  you  must  do  it, 
but  we  go  and  see  Skinny  Madden.' 

"So  B ,  Kidd  and  another  man  went  to 

Skinny's  saloon.  Madden  greeted  them  cor- 
dially and  taking  B 's  hand  said:  *I  am 

glad  to  see  you.' 

"  'You  be  glad  to  see  me,'  said  B *pe- 

cause  you  tink  I  have  no  use  for  Charley 

Dold.     I   remember  de   time  wen  you   and 

[319] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

your  friends  were  subborting  Charley  Dold; 
I  know  you  be  pretty  foxy,  but  Jesus!  Charley 
Dold  fool  you,  but  he  deceive  everybody  else, 
too.  He  no  draw  the  line  on  you.  I  know 
dat  you  be  crooked,  Skinny  Madden,  and  I 
know  dat  Charley  Dold  be  bigger  crooked.  I 
know  dat  you  put  up  a  fight.  I  know  dat 
you  stick  by  your  friends  and  I  know  dat 
Charley  Dold  never  puts  up  a  fight,  but  gets 
his  friends  into  de  fight  and  den  he  gets  a 
telegram:  he  has  to  go  away  wen  tings  come 
to  crisis.  I  know  him  in  Detroit,  in  New  Or- 
leans, in  Philadelphia,  everywhere :  he  always 
gets  a  telegram.     So   I  call  him  Telegram 

Charley/    This  was  the  report  v\^hich  B 

gave  me  of  the  meeting. 

"Previous  to  the  meeting  of  the  Federation 
at  which  Kidd  was  to  umpire,  Tim  Quinn  and 
one  or  two  others  called  together  in  caucus 
the  true  and  faithful  of  the  reforming  flock. 
It  was  called  out  of  respect  to  Madden's  cun- 
ning and  power.  The  members  of  the  caucus 
were  pledged  to  secrecy,  so  that  Madden 
would  not  learn  until  too  late  to  act.  He 
had  accepted  in  good  faith  the  proposition 
that  Kidd  should  preside  at  the  meeting,  and 
therefore  made  no  preparations  and  did  not 
[320] 


Politics  in  the  Federation. 

get  out  his  friends  in  force.  So  when  the 
day  came,  the  reformers  were  all  present  and 
twenty  or  thirty  policemen,  but  not  many 
of  Madden's  men.  Kidd  was  there,  but  the 
reformers  did  not  want  him  to  take  the  chair, 
as  they  felt  they  did  not  need  him  and  could 
railroad  through  the  thing  as  they  pleased. 
Madden  insisted  on  Kidd's  presiding,  and 
Dold  was  at  first  against  it.  But  he  came 
around,  and  if  it  had  not  been  for  Quinn,  per- 
haps Kidd  would  have  taken  the  chair.  But 
he  saw  that  there  was  no  united  wish  for 
him  to  act,  so  he  withdrew.  The  report  of 
the  clerks  was  therefore  easily  endorsed,  and 

Dold  was  declared   legally  elected.     B 

was  delighted  at  the  truth  of  his  prediction, 
and  Sam  Gompers,  the  old  side-stepper,  got 
no  blame,  but  it  made  Tom  Kidd  look  like 
thirty  cents." 

Anton's  election  as  delegate  came  during 
the  time  that  I  was  with  him  in  Chicago.  It 
gave  him  an  enormous  amount  of  satisfaction. 
He  had  "played  politics"  for  the  first  time, 
and  had  won.  He  had  beaten  an  organiza- 
tion which  he  deemed  hypocritical,  and  that, 
without  allying  himself  with  the  grafters. 
He  had  made  no  promises  to  anybody,  and 
[321] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

had  no  debts  to  pay.  He  now  had  an  oppor- 
tunity to  satisfy  his  temperament  by  a  change. 
Held  down  as  he  had  been  for  several  years 
closely  to  his  work,  the  prospect  of  a  trip  to 
Pittsburg  under  interesting  circumstances  was 
like  "hearing  the  whistles  blow  in  the  spring." 
What  was  left  of  the  hobo  in  him  contributed 
to  his  general  joy. 

Soon  after  his  election,  his  Union  gave  him 
"a  blow-out"  and  $50  toward  his  expenses. 
"Maggie  was  tickled  to  death,"  he  said. 
"She  could  not  sleep  for  joy.  Now  that  I 
am  going  to  the  Convention,  I  want  her  to 
have  a  vacation,  too.  If  she  didn't,  it  would 
spoil  my  pleasure."  So  Maggie  went  with 
the  children  to  the  old  home  in  Clinton,  and 
had  a  good  time  "disturbing,"  as  she  put  it, 
her  old  friends,  with  her  "radical"  ideas. 
"Before  I  had  been  there  a  week,"  she  said, 
"I  had  three  mothers  deserting  their  children 
at  night,  to  go  out  and  have  a  good  time  at 
some  social.  And  I  put  a  lot  of  other  ideas 
into  their  heads,  so  that  before  I  left  they  had 
begun  to  think  some." 


[322] 


CHAPTER  XV. 

The  Intellectual  Proletariat. 

While  Anton  was  in  Pittsburg,  I  saw  a 
great  deal  of  the  "radicals."  I  came  to  pre- 
fer sitting  with  Marie  and  Terry  in  their 
simple  salon  and  marveling  at  their  sophis- 
tication and  expressiveness,  or  talking  with 
the  large-passioned  Esther  or  the  good,  calm 
and  clear-sighted  Jay — to  prefer  this  to  any 
of  what  might  be  called  my  more  normal  oc- 
cupations. Of  Clarence  Darrow,  too,  I  saw 
a  great  deal  at  this  time.  More  gifted,  more 
clever,  and  more  able  than  any  other  Chicago 
"radical,"  he  is  not  as  consistent  or  logical  as 
many  of  them.  He  is  a  friend  of  the  prole- 
tariat, a  philosopher,  a  literary  man  and  a 
dreamer,  but  he  is  also  a  lawyer,  a  politician, 
and  a  money-maker.  He  has  a  marvelous  in- 
consistency of  mind,  but  a  rich  temperament 
and  many  "parts."  Connected  as  he  is,  of 
course,  with  the  "successful"  people,  and  the 
bourgeoisie,  he  is  not  as  clear  a  case  as  the 
[323] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

rank  and  file  of  the  radicals.  He  is  a  friend 
of  the  laboring  man,  not  a  laboring  man  either 
in  fact  or  by  instinct. 

But  it  is  this  being  the  real  thing,  or  based 
upon  the  real  proletariat,  as  Terry  and  Marie 
and  Anton  and  Maggie  and  Jay  and  Esther, 
and  many  of  the  others  are,  which  gives  them 
their  consistency,  their  meaning  and  their  elo- 
quence. It  is  they  who  get  radical  ideas,  in- 
stincts and  hopes  first  hand,  and  have  conse- 
quently that  freshness  of  mind  and  of  expres- 
sion which  springs  from  coming  actually  in 
contact  with  the  material  of  their  emotion  and 
their  thought.  A  thousand  times  I  felt  my- 
self to  be  in  the  midst  of  a  kind  of  renaissance 
of  labor. 

This  I  felt  whether  I  was  in  a  group  of  ac- 
tive, hard-working,  hard-drinking,  practical- 
ly-minded labor  leaders,  with  their  vast  phys- 
ical joy  in  life  and  their  belligerent  hopes 
of  the  future,  their  longing  for  "velvet,"  and 
consequent  occasional  corruption,  their  pas- 
sionate, unconventional  habits,  rough-house 
methods  and  rough  capacity  for  stating  their 
meaning  in  their  own  way;  or  whether  I  was 
with  the  gentle,  anaemic  commentators  on  life, 
those  who  had  been  workers  and  had  become 
[324] 


The  Intellectual  Proletariat. 

agitators  or  merely  contemplative  reflectors — 
people  like  Terry  and  Marie  and  Jay  and  Es- 
ther. What  makes  Anton  so  peculiarly  inter- 
esting to  me  is  that  he  is  both  these  things — 
he  is  the  rough,  practical  belligerent,  ideal- 
istic laboring  man  in  the  movement,  on  the 
one  hand,  and  on  the  other  he  is  the  reflective 
anarchistic,  gentle,  poetic  commentator  on  the 
facts  of  the  labor  which  he  has  experienced 
so  typically.  I  have  often  been  at  a  loss  to 
know  whether  he  is  primarily  a  practical  man, 
and  a  liver,  or  a  philosopher,  and  an  expresser. 
What  he  is  without  doubt  is  Ein  Gemuth — a 
temperament — for  that  accounts  both  for 
practical,  rich  activity;  and  for  emotional  and 
full-blooded  love  for  ideas. 

I  have  almost  never  seen  Anton  depressed; 
but,  one  night,  while  he  was  at  the  Pittsburg 
Convention,  I  had  an  opportunity  to  see  how 
very  far  in  the  moral  depths  Terry  and  Marie, 
the  aristocrats  of  the  slums,  the  Platonic  ex- 
pressers  of  the  proletariat,  the  reflective  an- 
archists, were  liable  to  fall.  I  had  been  at  the 
salon,  had  sat  for  hours  over  the  cigarette  and 
the  can  of  beer.  Terry  had  talked  about  some 
of  the  anarchists  in  Chicago  and  other  cities, 
their  weaknesses,  their  personal  traits,  with  a 
[325] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

fine  psychological  touch  and  with  an  almost 
never-failing  delicacy  and  originality  of  ex- 
pression. He  was  happy  at  it,  and  so  were 
we.  But  very  late  in  the  night  we  went  out 
and  took  a  walk  in  the  early  dawn  of  a  Chi- 
cago day,  winding  up  in  the  back  room  of  a 
saloon.  Terry  drank  several  glasses  of  whis- 
key, and  Marie,  too;  that,  and  the  fatigue  of 
the  late  hour  and  their  accumulated  anaemia 
resulting  from  bad  food,  put  them  in  a  mood 
of  extreme,  though  expressive  despondency. 
It  was  impossible  to  get  cigarettes  in  that 
neighborhood,  and  that,  too,  was  an  added 
burden. 

Terry  then  burst  out  into  a  talk  of  extreme 
anarchy;  said  he  desired  to  prey  on  society, 
to  make  himself  a  complete  burden.  He  re- 
jected the  elementary  basis  of  morality,  and 
said  that  the  only  reason  he  did  not  steal  was 
that  he  had  never  seen  a  really  good  oppor- 
tunity. He  had  known  thieves  and  prosti- 
tutes well,  and  now  he  spoke  of  their  qualities 
with  affection  and  seemed  perversely  to  love 
whatever  was  rejected  by  organized  society. 

Marie  referred  to  one  of  my  books,  "The 
Autobiography  of  a  Thief,"  and  asked  me 
why  I  had  attempted  to  get  the  man  to  "re- 
[326] 


The  Intellectual  Proletariat. 

form."  I  replied  that,  aside  from  conven- 
tional morality,  this  man  was  a  "dead"  thief, 
and  had  no  chance  except  through  reform. 
Terry  then  spoke  of  the  advantages  of  prison 
life,  the  opportunity  for  terrific  thought.  I 
objected  on  the  social  ground — for  a  sensitive, 
developed  man,  with  social  instinct  and  love 
of  woman,  life  in  prison  is  hell  and  an  in- 
evitable step  to  the  mad-house.  "You,  Ter- 
ry," I  said,  "are  too  old  and  too  sensitive  to 
be  a  good  criminal." 

Then  I  protested  against  the  cutting  off  of 
all  morality.  Why  live  among  men  at  all  if 
we  are  to  strip  ourselves  of  everything?  The 
impossibility  of  his  attitude  came  home  some- 
what to  Terry  when  I  spoke  of  the  depriva- 
tions of  Marie,  of  her  not  having  a  nice  place 
to  live,  insufficient  food,  etc.  That  night  I 
pointed  out  to  him,  she  did  not  even  have  a 
cigarette,  and  there  were  large  holes  in  her 
shoes.  Marie,  who  was  very  tired  and  a  lit- 
tle intoxicated,  had  been  complaining  about 
the  lack  of  the  necessary  cigarette. 

"You  don't  like  me,"  she  said,  complaining- 
ly,  to  Terry.  "You  won't  do  a  thing  for  me. 
You  even  steal  my  cigarette  tobacco." 

Terry  felt  this  reproach,  and  admitted  to 
[327] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

me  that,  if  he  were  in  a  different  mood,  he 
might  tell  a  different  story.  "But  it  seldom 
pays,"  he  said,  "to  tell  one's  real  mood."  Fi- 
nally, we  went  sadly  to  bed. 

But  it  was  not  always  thus,  not  even  gen- 
erally. I  usually  found  these  two  people  ex- 
cited, interested  and  pleased  with  ideas  or 
with  the  beauty  they  were  able  to  find  in 
books.  I  shall  quote  here  a  few  of  the  things 
they  said — only  a  few  was  I  able  to  record 
at  the  time  or  shortly  after.  All  records  are 
insufficient:  lag  behind  the  reality.  The  in- 
evitableness  of  this  will  easily  be  recognized 
by  anybody  who  has  ever  attempted  to  record 
a  conversation.  Fortunately,  Marie  has  writ- 
ten me  some  excellent  letters,  in  which  she 
expresses  herself  characteristically.  Some  of 
the  ideas  no  doubt  originate  with  the  more 
philosophic  Terry,  but  the  phrase  is  given  its 
turn  by  her  more  artistic  personality. 

"My  ancestral  blood  has  flowed  through 
scoundrels  since  the  flood,"  is  a  quotation  of 
which  Terry  is  peculiarly  fond. 

"It  is  only  in  voluntary  association  that  man 
is  fine,"  is  another  statement,  by  an  unfortu- 
nate man,  often  appreciatively  quoted  by  the 
tenement  philosopher.  William  Morris'  dic- 
[328] 


The  Intellectual  Proletariat. 

turn,  *'Art  was  not  born  in  a  palace.  She  was 
taken  sick  there" — this  is  much  loved  in  the 
salon. 

From  Marie's  letters  I  glean  the  following: 

"I  love  children,  they  are  such  true  and 

fearless  rebels.     I  can't  imagine  how  people, 

able  to  take  care  of  them,  could  ever  be  blue 

with  such  optimistic  and  anarchistic  little  ones 

around  them." 

Here  are  some  of  her  literary  appreciations : 

"Tolstoi  has  truly  a  contempt  for  art,  and 

also  a  contempt  for  some  of  the  finest  things 

in  life,  love,  for  instance.     His  ideals  of  love 

are   all   very  well   for   septuagenarians,   but 

won't  do  at  all  for  us  young  folks." 

"What  delightful  liberties  Keats  takes  with 
his  rhymings,  and  his  quaint  expressions,  al- 
most cockney,  some  of  them.     I  noticed  one 
little  word  he  must  have  been  fond  of  using, 
which  gives  a  sort  of  brisky  air  to  his  verse. 
"  'He  was  a  poet,  sure  a  lover  too.' 
"Perhaps  this  fondness  of  mine  for  these 
quaint  expressions  in  poetry  is  because  I  can't 
appreciate  too  much  pure  poetry.     I  never 
could  read  Milton,  and  still  I  can't  mush 
over  Whitman.     Talking  of  mushing,  I  really 
must  get  more  acquainted  with  little  Sadie. 
[329] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

There  is  a  little  girl  that  likes  mushing  over 
poetry  all  right.  I  have  a  complete  edition 
of  Swinburne,  which  I  must  study  some  more 
and  then  capture  little  Sadie  and  see  if  we 
both  can't  have  poetic  delirium.  She  has 
been  pensive  and  interesting,  of  late,  for  since 
the  Poet  left,  she  has  had  'no  one  to  worry 
about' " 

Sadie  is  one  of  the  little  "anarchistic"  Jew- 
esses of  whom  there  are  many  in  the  "move- 
ment." She  is  intelligent  and  cultivates  care- 
fully an  air  of  mystery  and  the  quality  of  the 
"baleful."  She  told  Marie  that  she  wanted 
to  be  a  beautiful  woman,  merely  to  be  able  to 
make  men  unhappy,  for  in  that  way  only  can 
men  amount  to  anything! 

"My  excuse  for  not  writing  before,"  wrote 
Marie,  "is  that  I  had  been  reading  *Inten- 
tions,'  and  it  has  had  an  irritating  effect  on 
me.  This  would  not  be  so,  perhaps,  had  Ter- 
ry not  been  discussing  it  nearly  every  day,  and 
brought  home  the  truth  to  me  that  I  myself 
was  deriving  all  my  emotions  from  art.  And 
it  is  true  to  a  great  extent.  I  realize  myself 
that  I  do  not  come  in  contact  with  life  enough 
to  satisfy  my  emotional  nature.  Therefore  I 
turn  to  literature.  I've  been  reading  Ibsen's 
[330] 


The  Intellectual  Proletariat. 

dramas,  the  more  mystical  ones  such  as  'The 
Lady  from  the  Sea,'  'Rosmersholm,'  etc.  It 
seems  to  me  these  are  almost  overwhelming 
with  their  moral  atmosphere,  as  you  would 
call  it.  I  sat  up  last  night  and  read  'Little 
Eyolf,'  and  I  truly  passed  through  terrible 
joys  and  sorrows  which  were  not  my  own. 
But  after  all  I  believe  I  would  rather  satisfy 
my  emotions  from  life  itself,  even  if  I  should 
have  to  pay  a  dear  price  for  the  joys  I  might 
find.  But  it  seems  that  some  of  us  cannot 
come  in  contact  with  life  unless  some  one  else 
fosters  in  us  the  'life  illusion,'  to  make  us 
believe  that  we  may  do  something  in  the  world 
for  our  good  or  for  the  good  of  others.  This 
life  illusion  was  lacking  in  me,  and  conse- 
quently I  did  not  participate  in  the  game. 
But  you  came  along  and  made  me  think  for  a 
while  that  I,  too,  might  do  something  for  my- 
self. Terry  is  so  critical  of  everything  that 
he  enjoys  nothing.  And  it  is  sometimes  most 
depressing  to  be  with  him,  especially  now 
when  he  is  in  a  supercritical  mood.  'Inten- 
tions' is  the  first  book  he  has  seemed  to  enjoy 
for  a  long  time,  and  that  book  is  so  much  in 
accord  with  his  own  mood  at  present,  and  Ter- 
ry's personality  is  so  strong  that  it  predomi- 
[331] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

nates  over  everyone  and  everything.  Thanks 
to  the  gods,  Terry  is  not  always  as  he  now  is. 
His  moods  vary  as  much  as  anyone's,  only  not 
quite  so  often.  I  sincerely  hope  I  shall  never 
become  as  critical  and  sceptical  as  Terry! 
Just  think  of  losing  the  faculty  of  enjoying 
life  and  of  having  to  receive  only  sterile  emo- 
tions from  art!" 

"I  am  often  amazed,"  she  wrote,  in  another 
letter,  "at  the  density  of  man,  who  dreams  that 
he  can  interpret  all  our  actions  and  thoughts. 
It  is  said  that  actions  speak  louder  than  words, 
but  I  believe  that  silence  speaks  better  than 
either.  If  we  could  only  judge  others  by 
their  thoughts,  but  alas!  how  very  seldom  does 
it  happen  that  one  can  express  these,  or  even 
make  any  impression  on  others  of  having  an 
inner  life,  which  I  believe  most  of  us  try  pain- 
fully to  conceal.  Have  you  ever  noticed  how 
feverishly  and  restlessly  we  talk  and  talk  try- 
ing to  avoid  the  least  approach  of  silence  lest 
we  should  therefore  reveal  our  inner  life?  I 
believe  that  more  of  our  real  selves  could  be 
shown  by  our  silences  and  not  by  our  words 
or  actions.  Whenever  a  great  joy  or  sorrow 
touches  us  deeply  we  are  silent." 

Here  is  a  specimen  of  her  humor.  I  had 
[332] 


The  Intellectual  Proletariat. 

written  her  that  I  had  taken  a  villa  in  Italy 
and  told  her  something  of  its  beauty.  She 
replied:  "Terry  and  I  are  having  quite  a 
strenuous  time  these  last  few  days  fixing  up 
our  new  home,  for  we,  too,  have  discovered  a 
little  villa  of  which  we  occupy  three  rooms 
on  the  top  floor  rear.  We  have  a  small  grove 
of  fine  willow  trees  on  our  right  and  a  lovely 
view  of  back-yards  and  chimneys  on  our  left. 
Unfortunately,  we  have  no  windows,  front  or 
rear,  which  cuts  out  the  view  of  the  railroad 
track  on  one  side  and  the  street  on  the  other. 
We  have  no  modern  improvements,  I  am  sor- 
ry to  say,  but  then  we  don't  care.  As  it  is,  a 
bath-room  would  be  superfluous  here,  because 
all  we  need  to  do  is  to  wait  for  a  rainy  day 
and  then  stand  or  sit  at  our  ease  in  our  own 
kitchen,  parlor  or  dining-room,  to  be  cleaned 
by  a  most  excellent  shower  bath.  The  roof  of 
our  villa  is  arranged  very  conveniently  for 
that  purpose. 

"As  for  light,  have  I  not  always  Terry  be- 
fore me?  And  indeed  the  light  of  his  genius 
or  personality  is  almost  blinding — at  times. 
If  we  feel  a  little  chilly,  why  we  get  into  a 
hot  argument  with  Kate,  for  instance.  I 
think  if  we  stay  in  this  villa  very  long,  we 
[333] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

shall  develop  a  whole  lot,  certainly  we  have  a 
good  chance  to  study  certain  phases  of  natural 
history.  We  shall  also  be  quite  proficient  in 
some  kinds  of  athletics,  as  our  floors  all  slant 
towards  the  centre.  It  is  really  quite  a  climb 
from  the  middle  of  our  drawing-room  to  the 
west  window.  It's  good  exercise,  and  if  we 
stay  here  a  while  I  am  sure  I  shall  be  able  to 
climb  up  Mount  Shasta  without  an  effort. 

"Three  other  families  occupy  our  villa,  or, 
rather,  three  old  women.  Their  families  sink 
into  insignificance  when  one  beholds  these 
three  ancients.  I  am  so  afraid  of  them,  when- 
ever I  have  occasion  to  leave  my  portion  of  the 
villa,  I  sneak  stealthily  by  their  windows  lest 
they  see  and  curse  me.  They  were  born  old 
and  lived  here  always,  and  will  continue  to 
forever  and  ever." 

In  a  less  cheerful  mood,  she  wrote:  "I 
used  to  think  that  all  mothers  and  fathers 
whipped  their  children  and  were  mean  to 
them.  But  now  I  think  the  parents  cannot  be 
otherwise.  Some  things  are  so  terribly  true 
and  common  and  trite  that  they  are  not  inter- 
esting. I  know  of  hundreds  of  fathers  and 
mothers  who  hammered  and  beat  their  chil- 
dren into  nonentities.  ^  And  they  are  living 
[334] 


The  Intellectual  Proletariat. 

to-day  what  they  call  happy  married  lives  and 
have  children  of  their  own,  which  they  in  turn 
hammer  and  beat  into  submission,  just  as  they 
themselves  were.  I  don't  like  the  atmosphere 
of  a  saloon,  [at  this  time  Marie  was  living 
above  a  saloon]  and  I  don't  like  the  dirty, 
common  work  that  I  would  have  to  do  here. 
And  yet  I'm  sorry  we  are  going,  in  a  way. 
There  is  a  beautiful  grove  back  of  the  house, 
all  full  of  great  big  trees.  I  love  trees. 
They  were  all  stripped  of  their  leaves,  and 
as  I  walked  on  the  ground  which  was  all  cov- 
ered with  these  poor  leaves,  I  thought  of 
Keat'spoem: 

*'  *  Too  happy,  happy  tree 

Thy  branches  ne'er  remember 
Their  green  felicity,' 

So  for  that  reason  I  would  like  to  live  there. 
It  must  be  beautiful  in  that  grove  in  the  sum- 
mer time.  But  I  would  have  to  work  so  hard, 
I  might  not  appreciate  the  beauties  of  nature 
at  all.  So  I  think  I  am  more  glad  than  sorry. 
I  spent  nearly  all  day  Sunday  exploring  this 
grove,  and  all  evening  I  sat  in  the  saloon 
drinking  a  lot  of  whiskey  without  getting 
[335] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

drunk,  played  several  games  of  pool  and  had 
to  listen  to  a  graphophone  playing  rag-time 
until  my  nerves  were  all  on  edge.  I  have  had 
a  black  mood  ever  since.  All  the  sympathy 
in  the  world  does  not  help.  At  moments  like 
these  we  feel  that  terrible  sadness  which 
comes  from  the  knowledge  that  each  one  of 
us  is  a  separate  soul.  Though  we  may  love 
each  other,  yet  there  is  something  in  each  of 
us  that  another  cannot  know,  something  that 
keeps  us  everlastingly  apart." 

This  expressiveness  of  Marie  is  not  shared 
by  the  remarkable  man  with  whom  she  lives — 
not  when  it  comes  to  the  pen.  In  speech  he 
is  subtle  of  the  subtle,  but  when  he  writes  he 
attempts  the  same  quality  and  his  manner  is 
labored.  He  has  not  the  ease  and  spontaneity 
which  this  factory  girl  of  twenty- three  shows 
in  a  remarkable  degree.  The  only  thing  of 
his  put  on  paper  that  I  possess  is  the  follow- 
ing. He  wrote,  in  a  note  to  one  of  Marie's 
letters,  sent  to  me  to  Italy: 

"He  who  finds  permanent  ground  for  mel- 
ancholia, may  not  be  troubled  by  the  shifting 
scenes  of  mankind.  This  nostalgia  of  the  soul 
is  the  last  resort  and  retreat  of  incurables  who 
take  their  last  stand;  the  forlorn  brigade  of 

[336] 


The  Intellectual  Proletariat. 

the  Milky  Way.  You  seem  to  be  about  that 
distance  from  us  now,  so  you  give  us  one  more 
reason  for  feeling  as  lonesome  as  we  do. 
There  are  so  few,  I  wonder  if  it  would  do 
any  good  if  there  were  more  of  us."  Then  he 
added,  as  a  matter  of  "labor"  news,  in  which 
he  knew  I  was  especially  interested;  "The 
latest  from  the  coal  fields :  the  stock  market  is 
ready  for  slaughter.  Ten  thousand  troops  in 
the  anthracite  region  await  the  behest  of  the 
BuUionaire,  ^On  with  the  dance.*  Let 
'stock'  be  unconfined." 

This  is  rather  forced;  the  literary  attempt 
is  too  obvious.  Yet  when  Terry  talks,  the  ef- 
fect is  just  the  opposite.  Everything  he  says 
seems  to  spring  profoundly  from  his  own  ex- 
perience, even  when  he  talks  about  "litera- 
ture." His  words  are  generally  very  sad  in 
their  suggestion,  far  more  so  than  those  of 
Marie,  who  is  younger  and  more  buoyant,  has 
much  more  of  the  "illusion  of  life."  Terry 
is  the  absolutely  self-conscious  proletarian: 
with  the  utmost  logic  and  consistency  he  ex- 
presses the  philosophy  of  the  man  who  has 
nothing.  There  is  consequently  a  most  pa- 
thetic melancholy  in  his  manner  and  expres- 
sion. Intimate  as  he  has  deliberately  made 
[337] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor, 

himself  at  times  with  the  most  absolute 
"scum"  of  society,  his  manner  is  one  of  great 
gentleness  and  wistfulness. 

I  have  told,  in  another  place,  of  how,  after 
working  steadily  for  many  years  at  his  trade 
as  a  tanner,  he  revolted,  because  he  saw  that 
society  was  "exploiting"  him.     The  precipi- 
tating reason  was  this.    A  rich  man  wanted 
to  start  a  new  business,  and,  knowing  of  Ter- 
ry's skill   and  practical   imagination   in   the 
trade,  he  asked  him  to  get  the  shop  under  way 
for  him.     Terry,  without  making  a  contract 
— he  is  by  nature  singularly  confiding  and  un- 
practical, as  all  these  anarchists  are — set  to 
work  and  organized  the  shop,  did  the  whole 
thing,  got  the  business  going,  and  then  was  of- 
fered by  his   employer   money   aggregating 
what  the  ordinary  wages  of  a  mechanic  would 
have  been  for  the  few  months'  time.     He  did 
not  accept  a  cent  of  this  money,  but  took  his 
coat  and  left,  and  has  never  worked  a  day 
since;  has  rejected  the  whole  system  of  or- 
ganized society;  has  gone  so  far  that,  if  his 
ideas  were  held  by  any  considerable  number 
of  men,  life  in  communities  would  be  impos- 
sible. 

Anton  is  often  impatient  at  the  fact  that 
[338] 


The  Intellectual  Proletariat. 

Terry  and  Marie  "do"  nothing;  and  yet  he 
impulsively  sympathizes  with  some  of  Terry's 
ideas — particularly  the  impatience  at  work 
that  is  not  interesting.  Terry  has  often  said: 
"If  society  would  give  me  work  that  inter- 
ested my  mind,  I  would  work  harder  than 
anybody."  Anton,  himself,  hates  routine. 
He  gets  no  satisfaction  out  of  his  mechanical 
labor  for  the  reason  that  the  modern  differ- 
entiation of  function  and  development  of  ma- 
chinery has  taken  all  that  is  individual,  all 
that  is  truly  artistic  out  of  the  mechanic's 
work.  The  large  art  of  an  earlier  time  was 
founded  largely  upon  the  detailed  art,  the  per- 
sonal expressiveness  of  every  little  object 
made  by  the  mechanic.  But  now  there  is  no 
personal  variety,  no  opportunity  for  the  me- 
chanic to  express  himself  in  his  work.  For 
this  reason  the  taste  of  the  community  in  art 
has  been  lowered,  and  the  interest  of  the  ex- 
cellent workman  in  his  work  has  been  taken 
away.  Now  he  works  only  because  he  must. 
Terry  does  not  see  the  necessity;  the  more 
moral  and  responsible  Anton  does.  That  is 
the  difference  between  these  two  men.  Neither, 
however,  has  any  love  for  labor.  And  be- 
cause society  and  the  Church  tell  them  they 
[339] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

should  love  labor,  they  rebel  against  society 
and  the  Church  with  all  the  passion  of  strong 
personalities. 

While  Anton  was  in  Pittsburg,  I  saw  not 
only  a  great  deal  of  the  "radicals,"  but  also 
of  the  more  or  less  hostile  critics  of  organized 
labor.  They,  of  course,  see  in  these  "rad- 
icals" only  a  lot  of  "cranks."  And,  indeed, 
there  is  no  doubt  of  the  absurd  character  of 
much  of  the  "radical"  body  of  men  and 
women.  Thus  far  I  have  given  most  stress 
to  that  side  which  to  me  is  interesting  and 
sympathetic  and  based  upon  real  feeling  and 
experience.  But  that  there  is  much  that  is 
half-baked  about  it  all,  there  is,  of  course,  no 
doubt. 

One  sees  a  great  deal  of  this  half-done  qual- 
ity of  thought  at  meetings  such  as  those  of  the 
Anthropological  Society  and  the  Social  Sci- 
ence League,  meeting  Sunday  afternoon  and 
evening  at  the  Masonic  Temple.  A  number 
of  extreme  pseudo-scientific  thinkers,  emotion- 
ally free-love  females,  mushroom  commentat- 
ors, Robert  IngersoUian  critics  of  religion, 
hold  forth  at  these  places.  .  Their  prophets 
are  men  like  Pentecost,  who  announces  that 
Christ  was  a  great  fool  and  that  the  prosti- 
[340] 


The  Intellectual  Proletariat. 

tutes  are  rapidly  freeing  society;  men  who 
have  a  little  more  general  education  than  the 
mechanics,  but  not  nearly  enough,  get  up  and 
say  emotional  absurdities,  and  women  from 
the  shops  lay  bare  their  extreme  crudity  of 
thought  in  hysterical  forms.  It  is  no  wonder 
that  Anton  cannot  resist,  in  such  gatherings, 
his  satirical  mood,  and  as  for  Terry,  he  gen- 
erally "stays  away,"  as  Marie  puts  it.  She, 
however,  goes  mainly  for  the  sake  of  meet- 
ing a  "comrade"  or  a  new  and  sympathetic 
man. 

In  the  West  Side  salon  or  in  the  domestic 
tenement  one  finds  the  reality,  the  genuinely 
intellectual  proletariat,  but  in  their  crowded 
meetings  is  the  same  banal  spirit,  in  a  different 
form,  that  one  finds  in  crowds  everywhere. 
It  is  after  these  meetings  that  the  elite  gather 
in  some  saloon,  and  there  men  and  women 
talk  freely  and  often  gaily,  and  the  basic  ideas 
of  the  proletariat  are  expressed  often  in  form 
and  with  considerable  beauty.  And,  in  sub- 
stance, it  is  never  frivolous  to  the  philosopher, 
for  underneath  it  all  is  the  serious,  unsmiling 
Spirit  of  Labor;  and  the  great  warm  feeling 
of  Solidarity,  of  human  love.  And  it  is  that 
which  gives  even  to  the  absurd  meeting  its 
[341] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

pathos  and  its  significance,  and  even  a  kind  of 
sad  beauty. 

When  I  first  became  interested  in  the  labor 
situation,  and  began  to  meet  the  men,  I  found 
very  little  that  interested  me.  They  were 
lacking  in  grace,  not  expressive,  not  peculiar, 
not  picturesque.  It  was,  at  first,  only  the  rec- 
ognition of  the  importance  of  the  subject  that 
held  me  to  it.  Finally,  of  course,  I  became 
fascinated,  as  I  got  beneath  the  surface  and 
came  in  contact  with  some  excellent  person- 
alities. 

After  I  had  once  seen  the  "eloquence"  of 
the  thing,  I  found  myself  continually  sur- 
prised and  displeased  by  the  hostile  critic  of 
organized  labor.  There  are  so  many  men,  of 
good  intelligence,  who,  because  of  their  lack 
of  feeling  for  humanity  or  because  of  the 
moral  astigmatism  induced  by  their  personal 
or  class  interests,  find  it  very  consoling  to 
harp  on  the  crudity  and  roughness  and  occa- 
sional "grafting"  propensities  of  labor  and 
make  of  their  bad  taste  a  substitute  for  justice. 

I  met  on  one  occasion  one  of  the  big  men 

in  the  "beef  trust."    He  is  a  good  citizen,  or 

is  so  regarded  by  the  world.     But  as  he  sat 

complacently  in  his  ofRce  and  told  of  how  un- 

[342] 


The  Intellectual  Proletariat. 

just  the  strikers  had  been,  as  he  spoke  of  his 
employees  in  a  tone  that  indicated  his  belief 
in  their  general  bestiality,  he  seemed  to  me  an 
object  totally  lacking  in  attractiveness.  "No 
man,"  he  said,  "can  stem  the  striker's  unrea- 
son." He  spoke  of  the  "small  margin  of 
profit"  in  the  great  beef  business,  but  said  that 
the  business,  being  in  a  way  a  public  neces- 
sity, must  be  carried  on,  even  at  a  loss.  He 
made  it  appear  almost  a  charitable  undertak- 
ing. One  reason  the  men  had  given  for  walk- 
ing out  the  second  time  was  that  the  girls  had 
been  insulted  by  some  of  the  foremen.  The 
trust  magnate  laughed  as  he  said  this.  This 
seemed  to  him  to  be  the  height,  or  the  depth, 
of  sentimentality. 

He  did  not  tell  me  what  I  knew  from  an- 
other source,  and  not  a  labor  source,  but  from 
an  independent  investigator,  a  woman  of  truly 
wonderful  and  penetrating  character  who  had 
more  to  do  with  the  final  settlement  of  the 
great  strike  than  anyone  else;  facts  known  to 
the  newspaper  men,  but  never  published,  be- 
cause they  would  have  been  too  shocking  to 
society.  The  condition  of  the  yards  when  the 
negro  strike-breakers  were  there,  and  the  girls 
from  the  Tenderloin  had  been  imported  in 
[343] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

large  numbers  as  a  bait  to  keep  the  strike- 
breakers at  their  work,  this  cannot  be  de- 
scribed. I,  knowing  these  facts  at  the  time 
the  comfortable  boss  was  talking  morality  to 
me,  did  not  feel  deeply  impressed  with  his 
virtue.  I  knew  the  essential  moral  sweetness 
of  many  a  rough  laboring  man;  Anton  is 
quite  incapable  of  a  cynical  attitude  towards 
women — free  as  he  is; — in  every  way  he  is 
the  moral  superior  of  the  big  trust  magnate 
whom  I  met — the  man  who  sneered  at  the 
strikers  and  at  the  common  working  girl,  who 
was  willing  to  make  an  indescribable  place  of 
his  workshop  and  at  the  same  time  was  "one 
of  the  boys  about  town,"  might  as  well  leave 
morality  out  of  his  talk. 

"Criminals  and  thieves  are  preferable  to 
workingmen,"  said  an  experienced  man  of  the 
world  to  me,  who  had  associated  with  big  rail- 
road men  all  his  adult  life.  "They  are  more 
educated  by  life,  are  entertaining  talkers  and 
have  a  kind  of  cultivation.  Laborers  when 
honest  are  raw,  and  when  clever  are  dishonest 
and  rawly  so.  They  are  in  a  terrible  hurry 
to  get  things,  and  they  hate  the  men  who  have 
things.  The  painter  in  my  hotel  room  said 
the  other  day,  at  the  mere  mention  of  L — 's 
[344] 


The  Intellectual  Proletariat. 
name    (a   rich   railroad   man)  :    'The 


.     He   gets   $100,000   a    year.'    As 

he  spoke,  wolf-like  hatred  gleamed  in  his 
eyes." 

As  to  unreason,  I  find  it  pretty  equally  dis- 
tributed between  the  "classes."  The  laborers 
are  often  extreme  and  unfair  about  their  em- 
ployers ;  but  no  more  so  than  is  the  other  side ; 
while  theirs  is  certainly  the  balance  of  moral- 
ity. Most  of  the  "radicals"  are  fanatics,  to 
a  more  or  less  degree,  but  the  injustice  based 
upon  fanatical  feeling  has  at  least  an  element 
of  sympathetic  human  nature,  while  that 
based  upon  privilege  does  not  seem  to  recom- 
mend itself  to  any  disinterested  contemplator. 

In  the  great  teamsters'  strike,  which  took 
place  while  I  was  in  Chicago,  there  is  no 
doubt  that  there  was  money  used  dishonestly 
on  both  sides;  it  is  likely  that  in  the  imme- 
diate situation,  the  men  were  more  at  fault 
than  their  employers.  But  the  possibility  of 
such  a  situation  had  largely  grown  out  of  the 
previous  commercial  immorality  of  the  em- 
ployer. Shea,  the  leader  of  the  strikers,  was 
a  rough  "grafter,"  in  the  sense  that  he  deemed 
it  fair  to  "get"  what  he  could  from  the  other 
side.  The  revelations  about  his  expenditures, 
[345] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

the  "Kentucky  Home"  episode,  and  the  gen- 
eral ugliness  of  his  moral  character,  were  es- 
sentially true;  but  the  newspapers  laid  bare 
all  these  things  with  a  view  to  turning  public 
sentiment  against  the  men.  It  was  in  striking 
contrast  to  the  way  these  same  newspapers 
covered  up  the  stock-yards  horrors.  If  the 
private  life  of  a  labor  leader  is  a  legitimate 
thing  to  expose  in  reference  to  his  public  mo- 
rality, so  is  the  private  life  of  an  employer. 
But  the  newspapers  of  Chicago  did  not  see  it 
that  way — for  commercial  reasons. 

I  met  Shea  on  several  occasions.  He  sat, 
more  or  less  like  a  poisonous  toad,  in  his  room 
at  the  Briggs  House.  He  seemed  a  fitting 
companion  to  men  like  Young  and  Driscoll, 
whom  he  was  supposed  to  meet  at  places  like 
"The  Kentucky  Home,"  and  settle,  over  bot- 
tles of  champagne,  the  affairs  of  the  city.  He 
was  certainly  a  low  representative  of  the 
roughest  element  of  labor;  but  yet  there  was 
a  certain  honesty  about  him.  Though  he  had 
every  reason  to  be  a  hypocrite  to  me — he  took 
me  for  a  newspaper  man — he  occupied  on  one 
occasion  nearly  half  an  hour  in  defending 
Sam  Parks.  He  indicated,  in  a  rough  way, 
that  everything  had  not  been  said  when  it 
[346] 


The  Intellectual  Proletariat. 

was  admitted  that  Parks  had  stolen  money. 

"If,"  he  said,  in  substance,  "you  want  to 
write  something  truthful  about  the  labor  sit- 
uatfon,  take  the  life  of  a  man  like  Parks. 
Don't  exaggerate  one  side  or  the  other.  Of 
course,  if  you  want  to  howl  about  dishonesty 
and  graft  and  all  that  you  may  please  the  cap- 
italists, who  want  to  hang  on  to  what  they 
have  stolen,  but  you  won't  get  all  the  truth 
about  a  man  like  Parks.  If  you  get  all  the 
facts,  I  think  Parks  won't  seem  like  such  a 
bad  fellow,  when  all  is  said." 

Shea  did  not  seem  to  me  like  the  ideal  man 
— far  from  it.  But  I  liked  him  better  than 
the  hypocritical,  sensual  and  respectable  mem- 
ber of  the  Beef  Trust  whom  I  had  inter- 
viewed. 


[347] 


CHAPTER  XVI. 
Some  of  the  Big  Men. 

Anton  came  back  from  Pittsburg  full  of 
the  eloquence  of  "wife,  home  and  family." 
Maggie  was  a  day  late,  and  during  those 
twenty- four  hours  Anton  was  miserable.  "I 
tell  you  what,  Hapgood,"  he  said,  "there  is 
nothing  like  being  away  from  your  wife  for 
a  couple  of  weeks.  It  makes  you  appreciate 
her  for  fair.  And  I  am  eager  to  get  back  to 
the  shop,  too.  I  think,  after  all,  a  mechanic 
who  gets  good  wages,  has  eight  hours'  work 
and  a  good  home  is  pretty  well  off.  Satur- 
^  day  night  is  enough  for  bumming  around.  I 
am  sure  I  don't  know  what  would  become 
of  me  if  I  didn't  have  a  regular  occupation. 
If  I  had  your  job,  for  instance,  I  think  I 
would  be  a  worse  fellow  than  I  am." 

This  speech  showed  an  extraordinary 
change  from  the  character  of  Tony,  the  Hobo, 
who  so  often  heard  the  whistles  blow  and 
[348] 


Some  of  the  Big  Men. 

boarded  the  box-car.  I  remarked  as  much, 
and  he  answered: 

"Well,  if  I  had  been  a  scab  I'd  never  have 
got  to  this.  Somehow,  working  for  the  rank 
and  file  and  fighting  with  your  fellow  men 
make  you  steadier.  It  makes  it  seem  like 
good  fun  to  be  responsible.  That's  why  it 
is  right  almost  to  force  the  non-Union  men 
into  line.  Life,  when  taken  right,  forces  a 
man  to  be  a  good  husband.  Why  not  force  a 
scab  to  be  a  good  citizen,  a  good  member  of 
his  class?  It  is  all  a  matter  of  fear,  with  these 
fellows.  They  can't  see  their  own  interests. 
You  must  make  them  fear  something  more 
than  they  fear  going  hungry,  and  then  you  can 
keep  them  in  line." 

At  the  Pittsburg  Convention  Anton  had  still 
further  opportunity  to  meet  some  of  the  "big" 
men  in  the  labor  movement.  I  have  often 
heard  him  on  the  floor  of  the  Chicago  Fed- 
eration meeting,  and  I  know  him  to  be  a  vig- 
orous, forcible  and  sometimes  witty  speaker, 
full  of  ideas  which  are  sometimes  too  subtle 
for  the  rank  and  file  of  his  audience;  some- 
times too  radical  for  them,  and  frequently  too 
playful.  They  were  evidently  too  radical  for 
Samuel  Gompers,  for  at  the  Convention,  after 
[349] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

one  of  Anton's  speeches,  he  turned  to  Tom 
Kidd,  and  said: 

"I  thought  you  said  the  Chicago  delegate 
was  a  sensible  fellow.  Why,  he  is  a  gatling 
gun.  He  goes  off  in  every  direction."  An- 
ton could  not  resist  the  opportunity  to  ex- 
pound some  of  the  shifting  ideas  of  the  prac- 
tical anarchist,  and  hence  Gompers'  remark. 
After  one  of  the  meetings  one  of  the  most 
conservative  leaders  in  the  American  Federa- 
tion made  to  Anton,  protesting  against  some 
of  his  speeches,  the  remark  already  quoted. 

"We  are  all  anarchists,  but  what's  the  use 
of  shouting  about  it?" 

"Duncan's  remark,"  said  Anton,  "is  true  of 
the  leaders;  and  it  is  more  true  of  the  rank 
and  file  than  most  people  think.  The  men 
don't  know  it  themselves,  and  are  frightened 
at  the  word  anarchist.  But  they  sympathize 
with  a  lot  of  things  that  conservative  people 
call  anarchistic,  and  if  one  man  is  a  little  more 
radical  than  the  others  he  can  have  anything 
he  wants  in  the  way  of  an  office.  That  shows 
what  direction  they  are  going  in. 

"It  is  hard  to  say  what  men  like  Gompers 
and  Mitchell  really  think,  because  they  are 
diplomatists  and  side-steppers.  Gompers  is  a 
[350] 


Some  of  the  Big  Men. 

much  abler  man  than  Mitchell,  who  has  a 
reputation  all  out  of  proportion  to  his  ability. 
There  are  many  men  in  his  Union  stronger 
than  Mitchell,  who  was  made  by  the  news- 
papers. The  miners  are  mainly  an  ignorant 
lot.  They  have  all  heard  Mitchell's  name, 
and  they  don't  know,  as  a  body,  any  other 
leader.  So  Mitchell  is  bound  to  be  at  the 
head,  as  long  as  he  wants  to  be." 

I  myself  have  met  both  Gompers  and 
Mitchell.  The  former  I  found  very  willing 
to  talk  facts,  but  he  shied  off  from  opinions 
with  the  astuteness  of  a  fox.  Mitchell  I  met 
over  the  bar  of  the  Briggs  House.  The  place 
was  full  of  labor  leaders,  and  they  all  talked 
freely,  except  Mitchell.  If  he  had  an  idea, 
he  kept  it  to  himself.  He  is  a  handsome  man, 
with  a  pathetic,  romantic  look,  as  if  he  had  a 
mission  in  life,  but  didn't  want  to  give  it 
away. 

Gompers  has  a  sense  of  dignity,  and  the 
song  which  the  anarchist  organizer,  several 
times  referred  to,  sang  and  was  overheard  by 
the  President,  did  not  please  him : 

"  Everybody  works  but  Gompers 
And  my  old  man." 

[351] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

A  story  told  me  by  Anton  still  further  il- 
lustrates the  character  of  the  President  of  the 
American  Federation  of  Labor,  whom,  by  the 
way,  everybody  respects,  and  justly,  for  he  has 
held  his  position  for  many  years,  and  no  one 
who  knows  him  can  doubt  either  his  ability 
or  his  honesty.  The  Anarchist  Poet  desired 
at  one  time  to  write  for  The  Federationist, 
of  which  Mr.  Gompers  is  editor.  Terry,  An- 
ton, the  Poet  and  one  or  two  others  went  to 
Thomas  I.  Kidd's  office  to  try  to  induce  that 
influential  man  to  speak  to  Gompers  about 
the  matter.  Among  them  was  the  anarchist 
organizer,  who  called  Anton  one  side  and 
said  to  him: 

"Anton,  I  am  surprised  at  you.  Do  you 
tink  Sam  Gompers  will  allow  an  anarchist  to 
fight  against  de  Socialists?  Wen  Sam  Gomp- 
ers can't  any  longer  have  de  Socialists  as  his 
enemies  he  will  lose  his  popularity  and  be- 
come useless.  He  wants  to  do  all  de  fighting 
against  de  Socialists  himself  and  don't  want 
no  anarchist  to  help  him.  Neder  Dom  Kidd 
nor  all  de  Kidds  can  influence  Sam  Gompers 
to  hang  himself.  De  strength  of  de  anarchist 
lies  in  de  weakness  of  de  Socialists,  and  Sam 
Gompers  knows  dat  and  wants  to  keep  dat 
[352] 


Some  of  the  Big  Men. 

weakness  all  to  himself  so  he  can  show  it  up  in 
de  Federationist." 

The  Anarchist  Poet  did  not  get  the  job. 
This  trait  of  Gompers  is  shown  by  his  general 
sensitiveness  to  newspaper  opinion.  When 
there  was  an  attempt  made  to  get  Gompers  to 
help  settle  the  teamsters'  strike  by  publishing 
the  truth,  his  question  was,  "What  will  the 
newspapers  say?" 

Anton  was  struck  with  the  tendency  of  the 
Convention  to  stick  to  "details,"  instead  of 
considering  general  principles  or  matters  of 
broad  policy.  "Everybody  was  there,"  he 
said,  "to  look  after  his  little  interests,  the  in- 
terests of  his  local  union,  of  his  city  or  his 
trade.  No  one  dared  to  say  anything  about 
bigger  things  for  fear  that  his  little  thing 
would  be  spoiled.  It  was  mainly  about  or- 
ganization matters,  questions  of  jurisdiction, 
etc.,  things  which  are  as  dry  as  dust.  I 
wanted  to  have  these  matters  cleared  up  quick- 
ly, so  I  recommended  that  the  executive  com- 
mittee be  instructd  to  put  through  these  juris- 
diction matters  in  a  certain  time.  There  was, 
of  course,  great  opposition  from  the  commit- 
tee, and  Vice-President  Duncan  retorted  that 
the  committee  ought  not  to  be  subjected  to 
[353] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

force.  Why  not  admit,  then,'  said  I,  4f  you 
object  to  force,  that  you  are  an  anarchist?' 
It  was  this  question  of  mine  that  led  to  Gom- 
pers'  remark  about  the  gatling  gun,  and  to 
Duncan's  private  statement  about  the  preva- 
lence of  anarchism  among  the  leaders." 

Shea  was  at  the  Convention,  and  Anton 
said  of  him:  "He  is  a  good  representative 
of  the  teamsters.  He  walked  into  the  Con- 
vention as  he  would  into  a  saloon,  with  his  hat 
on,  and  spitting  to  the  right  and  to  the  left." 

Anton's  tendency  to  criticize  everything  ex- 
tends quite  as  thoroughly  to  the  anarchists  as 
to  anything  else.  What  he  loves  most  about 
the  theory  of  anarchy  is  its  individualism :  he 
is  consequently  dead  against  the  Socialists. 
And  yet  he  is  often  exasperated  at  the  lack  in 
the  anarchists  of  practical  sense.  The  Con- 
vention passed  a  resolution  combating  the 
alien  laws  and  approving  of  the  admission  into 
the  country  of  all  political  exiles  from  Europe. 
"This  resolution,"  he  said,  "ought  to  have  been 
noticed  by  the  anarchists  and  their  newspa- 
pers, and  ought  to  have  been  approved  by 
them.  But  there  was  not  a  word  said  or  writ- 
ten about  it.  The  anarchists  lack  blood,  and 
in  this  country  are  dead.  They  don't  know  or 
[354] 


Some  of  the  Big  Men. 

care  what  is  going  on.  It  is  only  the  opposi- 
tion of  the  police  that  keeps  them  alive.  If 
they  were  let  alone  and  allowed  to  spout,  as 
they  are  in  England,  they  would  all  have  died 
of  emotional  starvation  long  ago.  The  execu- 
tion of  the  Chicago  anarchists  in  1886  has 
been  the  main-stay  of  the  movement  ever 
since. 

"The  best  thing  about  the  anarchist  who 
calls  himself  an  anarchist — not  the  practical 
men  with  anarchistic  tendencies  such  as  I  am 
or  other  labor  leaders — is  his  emotion.  He 
is  a  fanatic  and  thrives  when  he  is  oppressed. 
It  would  be  well  for  the  labor  movement  if 
there  were  more  emotion  in  the  American 
Federation  of  Labor  affairs.  Sentiment 
ought  to  have  some  sway  in  this  great  move- 
ment, but  I  found  no  sentiment  at  the  Con- 
vention— all  dry  routine  and  wire-pulling. 
All  is  based  on  cold,  calm  reason,  but  that  is 
not  enough.  All  is  based  on  selfishness,  or 
nearly  all.  It  is  the  class  struggle  much  more 
than  it  ought  to  be. 

"It  would  be  well  if  there  were  some  men 
high  up  in  Federation  affairs  who  had  senti- 
ment, even  sentimentality.  A  man  like  Eu- 
gene Debs,  the  famous  Socialist,  would  be 
[355] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

very  useful  in  that  way.  His  career  has  been 
an  interesting  one.  Nearly  all  labor  leaders 
spring  into  prominence  at  a  time  when  it  re- 
quires courage,  determination  and  more  or 
less  extreme  radical  attitude,  but  soon  after 
they  assume  the  position  of  responsibility,  they 
become  more  conservative,  with  but  few  ex- 
ceptions. Debs  was  one  of  those  exceptions. 
In  the  great  railroad  trouble  of  '94,  Debs 
called  a  general  strike.  Public  opinion  was 
so  strong  that  he  showed  his  hand  before  he 
was  ready.  So  that  the  organization  was 
mainly  acting  on  impulse  and  enthusiasm.  It 
was  only  two  years  old,  and  was  inexperi- 
enced and  undisciplined,  and  expected  too 
much  from  the  particular  individuals  chosen 
to  lead  the  strike.  The  result  of  such  hasty 
action  is  usually  defeat.  In  this  case,  it  was 
complete  annihilation  of  the  organization ;  but 
the  strike  made  Debs  so  prominent  that  he  be- 
came candidate  for  President  of  the  United 
States  on  the  Socialist-Democratic  ticket. 
He  is  a  wonderful  orator  and  a  splendid  or- 
ganizer, but,  lacking  in  executive  ability,  is  a 
bad  leader  in  a  strike,  not  because  he  fears  to 
take  an  unpopular  position,  but  because  his 
character  is  emotional  and  sentimental.  He 
[356] 


Some  of  the  Big  Men. 

has  never  been  a  strong  power  in  organized 
labor,  except  among  the  Socialist  enemies  of 
the  Federation.  If,  however,  a  man  of  his 
character  were  as  active  in  the  Federation  as 
he  is  among  the  Socialists,  it  would  be  of  great 
value  in  introducing  sentiment  into  the  ac- 
tions of  that  too  practical  body  of  men." 

It  seems  difficult,  indeed,  for  a  practical  la- 
bor leader,  engaged  actively  in  the  special 
question  of  raising  wages  and  shortening 
hours,  to  retain  the  general  emotion  and  im- 
aginative interest  in  what  is  called  the  larger 
issues.  The  anarchist  organizer  seems  to  be 
one  of  the  few  men  who  have  been  able  to  re- 
tain his  original  enthusiasm.  Another  man 
who  is  as  enthusiastic  as  he  was  in  the  flush 
of  his  experience  in  the  movement  is  the 
President  of  the  Woodworkers*  Union,  a 
friend  of  Anton's,  whom  I  have  met  and  heard 
speak.  He  does  not  appeal  to  sentiment,  is 
very  clear  and  practical  in  his  talk  and  in  his 
measures.  But  away  back  in  his  heart  lives 
his  one  strong  interest:  the  labor  movement. 
He  has  a  strong  intelligence,  and  is  singularly 
simple  in  his  interests.  He  has  never  mar- 
ried; he  does  not  believe  that  a  man  can  do 
justice  to  both  a  wife  and  the  labor  move- 
[357] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

ment.  Although  he  has  been  practically  ac- 
tive among  men  for  many  years,  he  is  as  sensi- 
tive as  a  young  girl  and  far  more  scrupulous. 
One  day  he  was  with  Anton  and  Tom  Kidd, 
when  the  latter,  who  is  very  fond  of  a  joke, 
said:  "Dinnie  is  going  to  see  his  sister  at  the 
expense  of  the  organization."  "Dinnie  was 
horribly  hurt,"  said  Anton.  "He  flushed  up, 
and  later,  when  I  was  alone  with  him  at  din- 
ner, he  said  things  which  made  me  see  clearly 
all  the  tenderness  of  his  nature.  Yet  Kidd 
meant  it  as  a  joke." 

Kidd  is  another  man  whom  Anton  deeply 
admires — perhaps  more  than  any  other  man 
in  the  labor  movement.  He  is  a  strong,  jolly 
man — a  "good  fellow,"  a  capable  drinker  and 
a  man  who  even  those  most  unsympathetic  to 
organized  labor  admit,  is  thoroughly  honest. 
He  did  more  than  any  other  one  man  to  build 
up  the  Woodworkers'  Union.  "For  many 
years,"  said  Anton,  "Kidd  worked  as  general 
secretary,  with  responsibility,  but  no  power, 
a  very  trying  position.  There  were  many 
calls  for  assistance,  but  no  financial  resources. 
He  is  absolutely  relentless  in  character,  and 
pushed  along  until  he  built  up  the  organiza- 
tion. For  several  years,  as  secretary,  he 
[358] 


Some  of  the  Big  Men. 

worked  at  a  salary  of  $15  a  month,  and  also 
worked  at  his  trade.  Then  the  organization 
took  all  his  time  and  gave  him  a  salary  of  $50 
a  month.  On  this  he  was  married.  In  1898 
came  the  big  woodworkers'  strike  in  Oshkosh, 
Wisconsin,  as  a  result  of  which  Kidd  became 
famous  throughout  the  country.  The  men 
proposed  5  per  cent  increase  of  wages,  a  week- 
ly pay-day,  and  the  taking  of  women  away 
from  the  machines.  This  demand  the  bosses 
rejected  without  even  a  conference  and  locked 
the  men  out.  Kidd  was  called  to  Oshkosh 
to  conduct  the  strike.  He  took  with  him  the 
anarchist  organizer  to  furnish  the  enthusiasm, 
while  he  took  care  of  the  diplomatic  end. 
There  was  a  street  riot,  and  a  little  boy  was 
killed.  Kidd  spoke  at  the  grave  of  the  child, 
and  laid  the  responsibility  of  his  death  at  the 
door  of  the  millionaire  employer.  The  an- 
archist agitator  had  spoken  a  night  or  two 
before,  and  gave  a  description  of  what  they 
did  to  scabs  in  Chicago.  This  was  credited 
to  Kidd,  and  he  was  arrested  on  a  charge  of 
conspiracy.  It  was  conceded  that  the  power 
of  the  corporations  was  not  easy  to  defeat,  and 
so  the  woodworkers  engaged  Clarence  Dar- 
row  to  defend  Kidd.  Darrow's  appeal  to  the 
[359] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

jury  went  throughout  the  country,  and  as  a 
consequence  Kidd  sprang  into  prominence  as 
a  fearless  and  radical  labor  leader.  Darrow, 
in  the  address  to  the  jury,  compared  Kidd  to 
Christ,  and  his  speech  at  the  boy's  grave  to 
the  Sermon  on  the  Mount.  It  did  not  take 
the  jury  long  to  acquit.  After  that,  Kidd  be- 
came a  prominent  man  in  the  American  Fed- 
eration of  Labor,  and  a  high  officer.  Before 
his  election  as  Vice-President  he  used  to  write 
in  his  woodworkers'  journal  serious  reflections 
against  Sam  Gompers,  but  after  working  with 
the  President  in  the  executive  council,  Kidd 
became  gradually  more  conservative.  This 
seems  the  way  of  the  world.  But  he  never 
lost  his  individuality,  and  is  still  a  strong 
and  emphatic  speaker,  but  more  cautious  in 
his  writings." 

I  met  Kidd  a  number  of  times,  usually  at 
the  bar  of  the  Briggs  House.  I  was  always 
interested  in  his  versatile  and  witty  talk,  in 
his  robust  temperament  and  pleasure  in  vigor- 
ous social  life.  In  his  way  of  meeting  peo- 
ple he  is  the  man  of  the  world — does  not  sug- 
gest at  all  the  reformer  or  the  emotionalist — 
seems  primarily  an  active  liver;  perhaps  more 
so  now  than  formerly.  He  is  incapable  of 
[360] 


Some  of  the  Big  Men. 

saying  a  sentimental  thing,  and  regards  the 
trades-unionist  in  America  as  at  present  in 
some  respects  well  ofiF.  Of  the  "boss"  he  can 
say  some  sympathetic  things.  One  day  he 
said  to  me  that  some  of  the  small  employers 
excited  his  sympathy.  "They  work  hard,  and 
for  themselves  and  their  families  only;  don't 
have  as  good  a  time  as  the  mechanic,  and  are 
not  interested  in  any  cause.  Sometimes  they 
don't  even  make  money.  I  was  a  small  em- 
ployer once,  and  after  every  pay-day  I  discov- 
ered that  my  men  had  more  money  than  I. 
So  I  went  back  to  work." 

Kidd  is  an  opportunist  in  life;  though  he 
believes  that  anarchism  is  the  highest  ideal. 
"Men  are  not  good  enough  to  be  anarchists," 
he  said.  With  Socialism  he  does  not  seem  to 
have  much  sympathy:  he  is  too  much  of  an  in- 
dividualist. "The  worst  things  about  Social- 
ism," he  remarked,  "are  the  Socialists.  They 
are  all  autocrats  in  temperament.  Their  des- 
potism would  be  worse  than  what  we  have." 

When  I  was  slugged  in  the  saloon,  I 
thought  the  episode  might  prejudice  the  men 
against  me,  and  I  went  to  Kidd  for  advice. 
That  was  before  I  knew  Anton  or  many  of  the 
men.  I  had  heard  Kidd  spoken  of  by  settle- 
[361] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

ment  workers,  employers, — everybody — as  the 
wise  and  good  man  par  excellence  in  the 
Chicago  Labor  World.  He  laughed  when 
I  told  him  of  my  trouble,  and  told  me  to 
forget  it.  *'It  will  make  no  difference  to 
anybody,"  he  said.  "That  was  just  a  man- 
to-man  affair,  easily  settled  and  easily  for- 
gotten." Kid  has  never  told  me  so,  but 
I  yet  believe  that  even  a  man  who  is  as  con- 
servative and  good  as  he  is,  dare  not  regard 
occasional  union  violence  as  altogether  a  bad 
thing,  certainly  not  a  very  immoral  thing.  It 
is  a  war  measure — mistaken,  perhaps,  but  in 
the  absence  of  any  great  human  morality  on 
the  other  side,  it  does  not  seem  like  a  great 
sin.  The  worst  enemy  in  Chicago  of  the  La- 
bor movement  admitted  Kidd  was  personally 
honest.  "But  even  Kidd,"  he  said,  "lets 
vouchers  pass  for  pay  for  violent  work  done." 
If  this  were  true,  it  would  not  surprise  me, 
and  yet  I  have  a  great  respect  for  Kidd. 

Michael  Donnelly,  the  man  who  was  twice 
slugged,  the  leader  of  the  great  stock-yards 
strike,  is  in  manner  a  great  contrast  to  Kidd, 
with  whom  I  have  seen  him  at  the  Briggs 
House.  Donnelly  has  a  quiet,  sweet  way 
with  him,  a  good  deal  of  gentle  humor  and  the 
[362] 


Some  of  the  Big  Men. 

reputation  of  being  an  eloquent  speaker.  He 
is  another  leader  generally  conceded  by  every- 
body as  being  personally  honest;  his  being 
slugged  probably  helps  to  prove  it.  His  call- 
ing of  the  second  strike,  against  his  judgment, 
is  often  cited  against  him  by  labor  men  and 
others  as  a  proof  of  weakness.  And  yet  it  is 
probable  that  if  he  had  not  called  it,  the  men 
would  have  struck  anjrway.  This  is  what  he 
says,  and  in  view  of  an  exceedingly  unreason- 
able element  among  the  butchers,  it  is  quite 
likely  the  truth.  If  he  had  been  a  very  strong 
man,  he  might  have  controlled  the  situation, 
but  some  of  the  unreasonable  ones  were  of  very 
vigorous  character. 

John  Joyce,  in  particular,  is  as  belligerent 
a  human  being  as  I  have  ever  met.  He  is  a 
splendid,  powerful  fellow,  and  as  he  paced 
up  and  down  his  parlor  and  fiercely  talked  to 
me,  I  felt  that  if  there  were  many  men  like 
this  strong,  aggressive,  unreasonable  fellow 
in  the  organization,  the  leader  had  indeed  a 
task  before  him  to  hold  them  in  line.  He 
has  a  natural  hatred  of  authority,  and  in  espe- 
cial of  the  authority  of  the  foremen.  Don- 
nelly said  Joyce  is  admittedly  as  good  a  work- 
man as  there  was  in  the  yards,  but  his  quarrel- 
[363] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

someness  always  got  him  in  trouble.  He  used 
to  insist  while  at  work  that  every  grievance 
be  settled  as  the  aggrieved  person  wanted.  If 
a  boy  who  was  holding  gullets  saw  he  would 
have  to  hold  two  more  than  those  prescribed 
within  the  hour  he  would  kick,  and  would  al- 
ways be  supported  by  Joyce  and  others  of  the 
"inflammables."  It  was  no  hardship  for  the 
boy  to  hold  any  number  of  gullets  prepared 
for  him,  but  when  the  men  got  strong,  as  they 
were  before  the  strike,  they,  as  often  happens 
on  both  sides,  abused  their  power.  One  thing 
they  insisted  on  was  to  have  twenty  minutes 
twice  a  day  to  go  to  the  toilet.  This  to  the 
calm  Donnelly  seemed  unreasonable. 

Before  the  second  strike,  when  Donnelly 
and  the  committee  had  agreed  to  a  settlement 
with  the  packers,  Joyce,  although  he  was  not 
on  the  committee,  came  into  the  room  and  said 
the  men  would  never  agree  to  the  terms.  He 
was  a  self-constituted  boss  and  had  great  in- 
fluence over  the  foreigners.  He  is  sober  and 
industrious,  and  has  an  interesting  family,  but 
his  spirit  is  the  most  untamed  and  aggressive 
I  have  met. 

Talking  of  the  superintendent,  who  it  seems 
had  threatened  to  discharge  him,  Jovce  said: 
[364] 


Some  of  the  Big  Men. 

"He  was  not  sufficiently  developed  physically 
•to  put  me  out."  To  this  man  Joyce  always  re- 
ferred among  the  men  and  foremen  as  "Mr. 
Doughbelly." 

Joyce  is  great  at  figures:  he  has  spent  his 
leisure  time  for  years  in  making  out  lists  of 
the  various  packing-houses,  number  of  men 
employed,  wages,  etc.,  "so  that  he  can  use  it 
as  a  club  over  the  packers,"  he  said,  "if  they 
lie  or  do  wrong." 

He  denounces  with  the  utmost  energy  su- 
perintendents and  scabs,  but  women  are  quite 
as  bad. 

"A  few  hen-pecked  husbands,"  he  said,  "are 
worse  than  all  the  scabs  in  America.  They 
are  chewed  up  by  their  wives  if  they  don't 
come  home  with  money,  and  if  they  come 
home  with  money,  they  are  chewed  up  because 
they  don't  come  home  with  more.  'What's 
the  use  of  giving  the  Union  50  cents?'  they 
say.  We  are  between  the  devil  and  the  deep 
blue  sea,  and  the  woman  is  the  devil. 

"Times  are  getting  worse,"  he  continued. 
"The  employers  are  getting  tired  of  educated, 
self-respecting  men.  They  generally  want 
niggers,  foreigners  and  scabs.  During  the 
strike  they  had  a  prize-fight  in  the  yards 
[365] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

every  night,  and  the  things  that  went  on  there 
between  the  nigger  strike-breakers  and  the 
girls  imported  to  take  the  places  of  the  girls 
who  had  struck  is  something  I  am  not  going 
to  tell  you  about." 

After  the  strike  was  over,  Joyce  was  one  of 
the  skilled  workmen  not  taken  back.  "There 
is  no  money  in  the  house,"  he  said,  "and  my 
son  is  on  strike,  too,  and  he  did  right.  I 
sleep  well,  you  bet.  I'm  all  right,  as  long  as 
my  family  have  food.  When  they  don't  have 
it,  I'll  go  out  and  get  it!" 

Two  or  three  lion-like  strides  across  the 
room  gave  me  a  vivid  impression  of  how  he 
would  "get  it." 

Our  interview  closed  with  his  words: 
"Cowardice  is  the  principal  thing  in  most 
men." 

With  many  men  like  this  in  a  union,  one 
can  easily  see  some  of  the  difficulties  with 
which  the  leader  has  to  contend.  The  butch- 
ers are  a  more  ignorant  lot  of  men,  as  a  rule, 
than  the  workmen  in  older  organizations  and 
of  more  skilled  trades.  But  one  of  the  most 
inflammable  and  fire-eating  men  in  the  whole 
Chicago  world  of  labor — and  it  is  not  an 
anaemic,  lying-down  world — is  at  present 
[366] 


Some  of  the  Big  Men. 

high  up  in  the  affairs  of  the  Federation — Tom 
Quinn,  with  whom  Anton  had  difficulties 
when  he  ran  for  delegate. 

Quinn  is  an  Irishman,  of  the  dynamiter 
variety,  and  loves,  of  course,  the  opposition. 
"The  movement  began  with  force,"  he  said, 
"and  it  will  continue  with  force.  At  the  first 
great  street-car  strike  in  New  York,  the  police 
interfered  with  the  German  strikers  who  were 
marching  peacefully  through  the  streets.  I 
was  one  of  the  Irish  boys  of  the  streets,  and 
how  we  did  stone  the  police!  It  was  that 
strike  and  the  police  interference  that  started 
the  Knights  of  Labor — an  organization  that 
lasted  until  it  was  disrupted  by  'conservative' 
graft.  All  graft,  by  the  way,  is  conservative, 
in  or  out  of  the  organization." 

Quinn  is  a  vigorous  fighter  and  believes  in 
physical  force  with  the  same  passion  as  in 
honesty  and  love  and  human  solidarity.  His 
love  of  honesty  led  him,  as  a  boy,  to  throw 
inkstands  at  the  school-master,  and  to  be  a 
leader  among  the  violent  street  Arabs  of  New 
York.  "Teddy"  Roosevelt  was  at  that  time  a 
leader  of  the  rich  boys,  and  he  and  Quinn, 
who  represented  the  proletariat,  sometimes 
came  in  personal  contact  in  the  free  and  open 
[367] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

street.  One  day  one  of  Tim's  crowd  hit 
Teddy  in  the  jaw  but  did  no  harm  except  to 
break  his  own  fist. 

"For  many  years,"  said  Quinn,  "I  did  not 
see  Teddy.  And  when  I  presented  to  him, 
as  President  of  the  United  States,  the  other 
day  in  Chicago,  the  strike  petition,  I  saw  that 
everything  was  changed  in  him  except  that 
jaw.  It  was  the  same  old  obstinate  organ  that 
broke  the  East  Side  boy's  fist." 

Quinn  is  one  of  the  most  democratic  people 
in  Chicago,  but  he  believes  in  bringing  about 
universal  justice  by  violence.  He  was  emo- 
tionally interested  in  the  municipal  ownership 
movement,  which  has  assumed  almost  the 
character  of  a  religion.  Full  of  personal  ego- 
tism he  did  not  understand  the  total  lack  of 
personal  egotism  of  a  man  like  Mayor  Dunne, 
or  the  impossibility  of  a  Mayor  of  Chicago 
always  acting  in  the  way  demanded  by  an 
emotional  enthusiast.  So  he  was  soon  as  vio- 
lently opposed  to  the  Mayor  as  he  had  for- 
merly been  violently  in  favor  of  him.  Quinn's 
general  note,  the  underlying  trait  of  his  char- 
acter, is  violence.     That  explains  his  being. 

But  in  Quinn,  this  all-pervading  violence 
assumes  an  attractive  form;  there  is  a  fasci- 
[368] 


Some  of  the  Big  Men. 

nation  about  a  man  who  is  so  manly.  And 
most  people  who  meet  Quinn  have  a  great 
respect  for  him.  His  brains,  however,  are 
not  as  big  as  his  spirit.  He  is  not  as  percip- 
ient of  conditions  and  does  not  understand 
human  nature,  is  not  nearly  as  much  of  a  nat- 
ural philosopher,  as  is  our  Anton ;  that  is  the 
reason  he  did  not  understand  the  latter's  atti- 
tude towards  the  Madden  machine  in  the 
Federation;  and  the  reason  why  he  remained 
so  narrowly  by  the  conventional  ideas  about 
the  relative  value  of  "graft"  and  "anti- 
graft." 

I  do  not  want  to  suggest  in  any  way  an 
apology  for  graft.  The  reaction  that  fol- 
lowed the  great  and  beneficent  exposures  of 
corruption  in  business,  politics,  insurance, 
trusts,  patent-medicine,  etc.,  was  based  largely, 
I  believe,  on  the  dislike  of  the  grafters  in  be- 
ing exposed.  It  was  a  natural,  but  an  ego- 
tistically motived  reaction.  We  cannot  have 
too  much  exposure.  But,  certainly  in  the 
labor  movement,  there  is  the  possibility  of  a 
state  of  mind  where  a  man  will  on  account 
of  his  ingrained  ideas  of  property  morality, 
or  other  current  morality,  neglect  a  larger, 
less  defined,  less  worked  out  morality.  Hu- 
[369] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

man  good  is  what  we  all  ought  to  aim  at ;  and 
often  a  passionate  insistence  upon  the  degree 
of  value  in  current  morality  is  an  obstruction 
to  moral  advance.  No  real  reform  is  possi- 
ble without  a  shaking-up  of  the  current  stand- 
ards of  morality  and  of  law. 

It  is  indeed  simple  and  touching  to  see  how 
moral,  in  a  child-like  and  unthinking  way, 
many  of  these  laboring  men  are ;  and  how  they 
think  morality  is  as  much  of  a  piece  as  pure 
red  or  pure  blue,  without  shadings.     Their 
enemies  shout  of  "graft"  in  the  movement, 
but  to  my  feeling,  the  dominant  note  is  one 
of   almost  pathetic   morality.     Soon   after   I 
began  my  Chicago  quest,  I  met  a  drunken 
machinist  in  a  saloon;  and,  being  quite  unac- 
quainted at  the  time,  I  asked  him  for  some 
information  about  the  local  situation,  infor- 
mation which  would  not  involve  names  or 
"expcsure"  of  any  kind.     Misinterpreting  his 
hesitation,  I  offered  him  a  little  money,  in 
exchange  for  an  eflfort  at  expression  on  his 
part.     To  my  surprise,  he  regarded  it  as  an 
insult.     "No,"  he  said,  "I'm  an  honest  man, 
and  won't  touch  your  money.     And  I  won't 
talk  to  you  any  more  until  you  can  get  The 
American  to  recommend  you."     The  Ameri- 
[370] 


Some  of  the  Big  Men. 

can  is  the  local  friend  of  the  workingman. 
Only  that  endorsement  could  allay  this  simple 
man's  vague  supicions. 

This  simplicity  of  moral  point  of  view  ex- 
tends from  the  rank  and  file  to  most  of  the 
leaders.  One  of  the  prominent  butchers, 
speaking  of  a  famous  labor  leader,  said  that 
no  man  ever  said  anything  against  his  money 
morality.  "Everybody  thinks  he  is  very  hon- 
est," he  said,  "but  everybody  knows  he  goes 
*on  a  bat'  now  and  then,  and  is  loose  with 
women.  I  believe  that  any  man  who  is  un- 
faithful to  his  wife,  is  unfaithful  to  the  rest 
of  us  and  is  not  the  right  leader.  It  is  im- 
possible for  a  man  to  be  honest  in  one  way 
and  dishonest  in  another." 

A  prominent  Chicago  teamster  expressed  to 
me  another  very  simple  view  of  morality. 
I  fancy  he  thinks  money  morality  is  not  of 
much  consequence;  due  no  doubt  to  his  ex- 
perience of  injustice  and  hardship.  "I  was 
a  slave  for  five  years,"  he  said.  "I  worked 
three  hundred  and  sixty-five  days  in  the  year, 
twelve  to  fourteen  hours  a  day.  For  this  I 
was  paid  $9  to  $i  i  a  week.  I  started  to  work 
at  six  in  the  morning,  on  Sunday  at  seven, 
as  a  piece  of  generosity  on  the  part  of  the 
[371] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

employer.  Things  like  that  make  me  a  little 
unwilling  to  condemn  a  man  like  Parks.  I 
don't  want  to  hear  anything  against  him. 
Nor  shall  I  say  anything  against  Shea,  who 
has  three  faults,  which  I  shall  not  name,  but 
is  as  able  a  man  as  there  is  in  trades-union- 
ism. He  is  too  frank  and  outspoken.  It  is 
all  right  for  a  man  to  be  frank,  but  if  he  is, 
he  ought  to  be  honest." 

This  leader,  acquainted  with  men,  and  the 
ways  of  the  world,  wonders  at  the  immorality 
of  the  employers.  "Every  boss,"  he  said, 
"every  man  who  has  much  money  for  a  long 
time,  is  immoral  sexually,  in  my  opinion. 
And  that  is  the  great  danger  of  the  labor  lead- 
er. He  starts  out  with  enthusiasm  for  the 
cause,  and  for  virtue,  but  often  when  he  be- 
gins to  have  power  with  the  men,  the  agents 
of  the  employers  come,  give  him  a  good  din- 
ner, here  in  the  Bismarck,  perhaps,  and  then 
take  him  perhaps  to  the  Everleigh  Club, 
where  he  comes  in  contact  with  a  kind  of 
luxury  he  has  never  before  experienced. 
When  he  has  acquired  the  vices  of  the  em- 
ployers he  can  no  longer  serve  so  well  a  cause 
that  is  hostile  to  them.  So  one  kind  of  im- 
morality leads  to  another  kind.  Take  Al 
[372] 


Some  of  .the  Big  Men. 

Young,  for  instance.  I  remember  when  he 
was  a  real  teamster  in  spirit.  But  now  his 
manner  of  life,  even  his  looks  have  changed." 

A  little  while  after  this  talk,  I  was  with 
this  leader  and  Shea  in  the  Briggs  House. 
Said  Shea,  "Al  Young  could  explain  more  of 
the  situation  here  for  the  last  few  years  than 
any  other  man."  "But  if  he  did,"  said  the 
other  leader,  "it  would  put  him  in  jail." 

It  is  natural  enough  that  the  simple  work- 
ingman,  to  whom  black  is  black  and  white  is 
white,  should,  when  once  shaken  in  virtue, 
cease  to  distinguish.  But  I  think  the  men 
who  yield  overtly  to  this  kind  of  demoraliza- 
tion are  in  the  minority,  that  the  labor  leader 
is  in  general  on  a  much  higher  plane  of  moral- 
ity than  the  average  man  of  the  well-to-do 
classes.  Many  of  the  prominent  leaders  have 
business  and  executive  ability  which  would 
have  enabled  them  to  make  money  in  any 
other  line  of  activity.  But  they  have  re- 
mained poor  men,  at  a  low  salary,  and  this 
shows  clearly  that  the  cause  has,  in  part  at 
least,  an  emotional  value  to  them.  I  know 
men  who  have  been  offered  large  salaries  by 
employers — and  large  bribes — money  which 
they  found  no  difficulty  in  rejecting,  because 
[373] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

of  their  temperamental  interest  in  the  work 
they  were  doing.  Anton  himself  was  offered 
the  position  of  traveling  salesman  at  a  good 
salary.  "I  didn^t  want  to  leave  Maggie  for 
any  length  of  time,"  he  said.  "But  anjrway, 
I  wouldn't  have  taken  it.  I  feared  I  might 
fly  off  the  handle  at  the  hypocrisy  of  society. 
And,  then,  too,  I  thought  I  would  be  bored. 
I  wouldn't  have  anything  to  work  for  except 
money.  And  I  wouldn't  have  any  men  to 
work  with,  except  tradesmen." 


C374] 


CHAPTER  XVII. 
Their  Points  of  View. 

Anton  and  I  and  Schmidtty — a  wood- 
worker with  a  ready  fist  and  an  honest  soul — 
were  sitting  in  a  down-town  cafe,  drinking 
beer  and  talking  philosophy  and  other  things. 
The  talk  turned  on  violence,  its  ethics,  its  dan- 
gers and  its  possible  excuse. 

"Since,"  said  Anton,  "the  unions  have  their 
educational  committees,  I  don't  see  that 
Skinny  Madden  is  such  a  bad  one.  Arrange- 
ments for  violence  are  never  made  in  the  com- 
mittees or  in  the  meetings,  but  only  when  two 
or  three  gather  together,  and  the  rank  and 
file  and  the  Lily  Whites  know  nothing  about 
it.  I  have  sometimes  persuaded  sluggers  not 
to  slug,  for  I  am  a  philosophical  anarchist  and 
do  not  believe  in  violence  on  principle.  But 
people  in  general  believe  in  force.  If  the 
laborers  controlled  the  government,  they 
would  not  employ  slugging,  which  is  now  the 
only  force  they  have.  They  don't  call  the 
[375] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

Boston  Tea  Party  a  strike,  but  it  was  violence 
and  against  the  law.  There  are  only  two 
real  things — genuine  humanity  and  virtue  on 
the  one  hand,  and  force  on  the  other.  All  the 
rest  is  hypocrisy  and  graft." 

"Yes,"  said  Schmidtty,  who  had  just  been 
elected  as  walking  delegate,  "there  is  only  one 
thing  worth  being,  and  that's  a  man.  I  don't 
feel  so  much  of  a  man  as  I  did  before  I  was 
a  walking  delegate.  When  you  get  mixed  up 
with  men,  its  hard  to  be  yourself." 

"You  are  losing  your  individuality, 
Schmidtty,"  laughed  Anton.  "If  you  hold 
your  job  you  won't  have  any  left." 

"You  don't  seem  to  lose  yours,"  answered 
Schmidtty.  Then,  turning  to  me,  he  said: 
"You  ought  to  have  heard  Anton  the  other 
night  in  the  meeting.  Someone  tried  to  in- 
sult him,  and  he  replied:  'You  can't  insult 
me.  You  have  no  reputation.  Yes,  you  have 
a  reputation,  but  it  is  in  the  wrong  direction.' 
In  this  same  meeting  Anton  called  another 
man  a  liar.  An  apology  was  demanded,  and 
Anton  said:  *Yes,  I  apologize.  I  ought  to 
have  been  more  exact.  I  called  you  a  liar. 
What  I  ought  to  have  done,  is  to  have  called 
you  a  damned  liar?' 

[376] 


Their  Points  of  View. 

"One  needs,"  said  Schmidtty,  "to  develop 
one's  vocabulary.  I  often  advise  scabs  and  I 
find  a  good  use  of  the  English  language  is 
handy.  The  other  day  I  met  a  scab  and  I 
said  to  him,  'Why  do  you  attempt  to  interfere 
with  men  who  are  trying  to  better  their  condi- 
tion? I  am  willing  to  admit  that  you  have 
as  much  right  to  the  pursuit  of  happiness  as 
I  have.  But  I  have  never  seen  the  fellow  yet 
who  would  ever  refuse  an  increase  in  wages, 
and  when  I  and  other  Union  men  have  taken 
risks,  paid  money  into  the  Union,  and  been 
blacklisted  by  the  employers,  and  have  at  last 
raised  the  scale  of  wages  which  benefits  the 
non-Union  men  as  well  as  us,  then  when  we 
see  a  man  try  to  get  our  jobs,  a  man  who  has 
risked  nothing  but  has  got  a  part  of  the  pie, 
why  then  I  think  it  is  time  to  argue  with  him. 
How  much  money  do  you  get?'  'Nine  dol- 
lars,' said  the  scab.  'I'll  get  a  job  for  you  at 
$14,'  said  I.  'Meet  me  in  front  of  the  police 
station,  so  you  know  I  won't  try  to  do  you.' 
The  scab  didn't  turn  up,  but  he  didn't  go  back 
to  work." 

"Sometimes,  though,  you  meet  a  scab  you 
can't  stand.  A  fellow  that  says:  'Sure,  I 
know  it's  a  strike,  and  that's  why  I'm  here. 
[377] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

I  don't  give  a  damn  for  the  Union.'  That's 
the  bloke  that  I'd  like  to  get  at.  He's  the 
kind  that  likes  a  row,  always  goes  where  there 
is  trouble,  and  after  the  strike's  over,  goes  on 
to  the  next  place.  He  don't  want  a  regular 
job.  It  isn't  exciting  enough.  He  is  a  per- 
petual hobo,  or  a  nigger,  or  something  that^ 
doesn't  want  to  work  steady.  The  boss,  of 
course,  wants  as  many  of  these  things  around 
as  he  can  get,  for  they  help  him  to  keep  down 
wages.  If  it  wasn't  for  these  immoral  scabs, 
it  would  all  be  much  easier.  But  it  is  a  good 
thing,  anjrway,  to  work  for  something  that  is 
good  for  humanity." 

"Schmidtty,"  said  Anton,  "is  absolutely  un- 
selfish. He's  a  rude  fellow  that  likes  to  use 
his  fists  in  the  cause  of  humanity,  but  he's 
good." 

"Not  so  rude  as  you,"  said  Schmidtty,  "and 
not  so  good." 

"You  are  both  rude,"  said  I,  "especially 
Anton.  But  his  rudeness  is  like  a  cock-tail. 
It  is  a  good  appetizer." 

"That's  well  put,"  said  Schmidtty. 

"I'd  like  to  be  an  appetizer,  as  you  call  it, 
for  the  whole  labor  world,"  said  Anton.     "If 
I  had  an  income  of  $50  a  week,  I'd  make  it  the 
[378] 


Their  Points  of  View. 

whole  business  of  my  life  to  break  down  the 
howl  of  conservatism,  to  make  the  rank  and 
file  acquire  more  initiative,  to  make  the  Union 
so  attractive  that  everybody  would  want  to 
join,  to  make  it  as  disagreeable  to  a  man  to 
quit  the  Union  as  it  is  to  quit  the  Insurance 
Company.  To  teach  men  these  things,  you 
must  be  with  them  constantly.  You  must 
teach  them  to  think  and  talk.  I  don't  think 
it  is  necessary  to  read  books.  Most  books  are 
harmful  to  the  laboring  man,  for  they  teach 
him  to  see  things  the  way  the  employers  see 
them,  for  all  books  are  written  by  the  em- 
ployers or  the  men  they  support.  I  at  any 
rate  can  find  more  satisfaction  in  talking  to 
men.  They  sometimes  tell  the  truth.  I  can 
talk  about  books  I  have  not  read.  I  hear  So- 
cialists, anarchists,  single-taxers  talk  about  the 
same  book,  and  from  what  they  all  say,  I  can 
get  the  essence.  I  shall  subscribe  for  The 
Literary  Digest.  That  will  give  me  all  the 
reading  I  need." 

Soon  after  this,  I  had  an  engagement  with 
Anton  at  the  Briggs  House.  I  found  him 
with  a  number  of  street-car  Union  men,  and 
a  deputy  sheriff  of  Chicago,  a  politician,  who 
had  evidently  been  drinking  too  much.  An- 
[379] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

ton  had  only  a  few  cents  in  his  pocket  at  the 
time,  and  when  I  entered  he  was  good-na- 
turedly temporizing  with  a  demand  made  by 
the  sheriff  that  he  should  "treat"  the  crowd. 

"Don't  apologize,"  I  overheard  the  sheriff 
shout.    "But  buy  the  booze." 

"I  never  apologize,"  said  Anton,  "I  ex- 
plain." 

"Don't  explain,"  roared  the  sheriff,  "just 
go  along  and  holler." 

The  official  seemed  to  me  extremely  inso- 
lent with  pride  of  office  and  whiskey,  and  I 
called  him  down  as  hard  as  I  could ;  told  him 
he  ought  to  have  more  sense  and  decency  than 
to  try  to  force  a  man  to  buy  drinks.  The 
sheriff  began  to  splutter,  but  when  he  found 
the  Union  men  were  all  against  him,  he  sul- 
lenly subsided ;  and  sat  alone,  deserted,  in  the 
cafe.  His  late  companions,  although  they 
knew  that  this  politician  had  been  useful  and 
might  be  more  so,  to  the  organization,  admin- 
istered a  series  of  rebukes  to  him  by  silently 
departing. 

Fearing  that  I  might  have  "spoiled"  some- 
thing that  was  on  foot,  I  indicated  to  Anton 
some  regret  at  my  action.     "I  sometimes  lose 
my  temper,"  I  explained. 
[380] 


Their  Points  of  View. 

"It  is  not  a  question  of  losing  your  tem- 
per," he  answered,  heartily.  "It  is  a  question 
of  taste.  He  was  acting  in  awful  bad  taste 
and  you  wouldn't  have  lived  up  to  your  char- 
acter, which  is  that  of  a  critic,  if  you  hadn't 
noticed  it.  It  was  a  good  thing.  Did  you 
see  how  the  men,  as  soon  as  they  got  the  cue, 
turned  the  fellow  down." 

During  my  intimate  association  with  this 
workingman,  I  was  frequently  struck,  not  only 
with  the  exterior  roughness  of  his  manners, 
but,  much  more  important,  with  the  genuine- 
ness and  often  extreme  delicacy  of  his  feel- 
ings. He  has  an  unerring  way  of  putting  his 
finger  on  the  weak  spot  in  a  man's  act;  and 
when  the  inhumanity  or  unkindness  of  a  thing 
is  felt,  his  resulting  expression  is  clear  and 
spontaneous,  though  sometimes  very  rough,  as 
on  the  occasion  of  his  father's  funeral.  He 
refused  to  take  his  hat  off  at  the  services,  be- 
cause the  minister  had  not  said  anything  about 
his  father's  personal  character. 

He  told  me  about  this  incident  the  night  of 
my  meeting  with  the  sheriff;  and  also  about 
how  on  one  occasion  he  treated  a  man  who 
was  making  "advances"  to  his  wife. 

"Maggie  is  a  woman  by  instinct,"  he  said, 
[381] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

"and  she  sees  everything  that  has  anything  to 
do  with  the  sex.  She  came  to  me  the  other 
day  and  said:  *C ,  was  here,  and  ex- 
plained what  a  pity  it  is  that  you  are  so  busy 
with  your  committees,  that  your  work  is  so 
hard  it  leaves  no  time  or  energy  for  your  mari- 
tal duties.  He's  always  saying  this  to  me,  and 
hanging  round  when  you  are  not  there.' 

"Maggie  likes  to  keep  me  guessing.  She 
is  enough  of  an  anarchist  to  know  that  I  must 
not  be  too  sure  of  her,  if  she  wants  to  keep 
my  love,  but  she  didn't  like  this  man  and 
wound  up,  in  her  story  about  him  to  me,  by 
calling  him  a  few  names. 

"So  the  next  Sunday  I  went  around  to  his 
house,  and  began  to  talk  to  his  wife,  when  he 
was  in  the  room.  I  said  to  her  just  what  he 
had  said  to  Maggie;  told  her  it  was  a  pity  her 
husband  worked  so  hard  he  couldn't  pay 
enough  attention  to  his  wife,  etc.  I  saw  he 
was  uneasy,  for  he  thought  I  must  have  been 
tipped  off  by  Maggie.  So  when  he  and  I 
went  out  together,  he  began  to  explain.  After 
he  had  got  in  deep,  I  told  him  that  was  the 
first  thing  I  had  heard  about  it.  He  felt 
cheap  then  for  having  given  himself  away  un- 
necessarily." 

C382] 


Their  Points  of  View. 

Maggie  and  Anton,  going  as  they  often  do  to 
the  meetings  of  the  Anthropological  Society 
and  the  Social  Science  League,  where  all  kinds 
of  criticism  of  society  are  indulged  in,  and 
to  the  various  "socials"  given  by  their  anarch- 
ist friends,  are  naturally  interested  to  a  con- 
siderable degree  in  the  doctrines  of  free-love. 
When  Anton  talks  of  religion,  when  he  makes 
a  violent  anti-culture,  or  anti-Christian 
speech,  he  seems  often  very  crude,  for  of 
course,  he  is  not  skilled  in  metaphysical  and 
theological  distinctions.  But  when  he  talks 
of  love  he  is  dealing  with  something  he  knows 
as  much  about  as  he  does  about  the  labor 
movement,  and  in  the  same  way,  from  experi- 
ence. His  attitude,  and  that  of  Maggie, 
toward  the  question  of  sex,  is  therefore  one 
curiously  civilized,  and  yet  abounding  in 
healthy  instinct  and  common  sense. 

Maggie's  friends,  Marie,  Esther  and  the 
Poet's  wife,  have  been  trying  to  make  her 
what  they  call  a  "varietist,"  but  Maggie,  al- 
though she  likes  the  free  talk  and  opportunity 
to  know  men  well,  shies  off  from  what  she 
feels  is  a  one-sided  and  merely  rebellious  atti- 
tude. Her  "radicalism"  in  this  matter,  is  of 
that  balanced  kind  which  makes  life  for  her 
[383] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

more  vivid,  quickens  her  emotions  and  broad- 
ens her  sympathy,  without  detracting  her  too 
much  from  the  big  stream  of  conventional 
feeling  in  the  matter. 

When  Maggie  returned  from  Clinton,  and 
appeared  with  the  young  woodworker 
Schmidtty,  at  the  Social  Science  League, 
Marie,  Esther  and  the  Poet's  wife  came  up 
and  congratulated  her.  "Maggie  is  now  a 
varietist,"  they  exclaimed,  happily.  "See 
how  happy  she  looks,  and  how  bright  her  eyes 
are!  Maggie  has  a  lover!"  It  was  naive  of 
them,  and  incorrect,  and  incorrect  because  of 
the  fullness  of  Maggie's  life,  not  because  of 
its  poverty.  Her  anarchist  lady  friends  do 
not  work,  and,  in  comparison,  are  anaemic 
physically  and  emotionally. 

Anton  encourages  this  attitude  in  his  wife: 
he  wants  her  as  alive  as  possible,  but  he  also 
wants  her  to  be  an  artist  in  life,  not  a  propa- 
gandist in  word  or  act.  He  wants  her,  as  he 
once  said  to  me,  to  drive  swift  horses,  but  he 
doesn't  want  the  horses  to  run  away  with  her. 

"There  is  danger  in  it,  Hapgood,"  he  said, 
"but  it's  fun." 

He  has  much  the  same  attitude  towards 
Maggie  as  he  has  towards  his  work  in  the 
[384] 


Their  Points  of  View. 

Unions  and  his  efforts  among  men.  It  is  in- 
teresting and  exciting  for  him  to  get  as  much 
life  as  he  can — to  play  the  game  fully,  hoping, 
of  course,  to  win,  but  risking  loss  at  every 
turn.  He  is  certainly  the  man  for  her,  for 
she  enjoys  life,  and  makes  others  enjoy  life. 
I  was  at  her  house  often  for  dinner,  and  it 
seemed  to  me  a  full,  rich  place,  this  working- 
man's  house,  with  this  good  and  cheerful  and 
active  and  free-minded  woman,  her  healthy, 
well-taken-care-of  children,  clean  house,  good 
food  and  interesting  guests, — anarchists,  So- 
cialists, Conservatives,  but  always  working 
people.  It  seemed  always  so  real  to  me,  the 
ideas  so  based  upon  facts,  so  instinctively  in- 
evitable. Even  the  thoughts  that  were  crude 
and  violent  pointed  so  forcibly  to  a  social  sit- 
uation. And  what  optimism  and  energy  and 
temperament  and  humanity,  what  hope! 

And  yet  I  remember  saying,  a  few  months 
earlier,  "There  is  no  charm  about  the  work- 
ingman.  He  lacks  the  interest  of  the  thief, 
the  Ghetto  Jew,  or  the  strolling  actress. 
There  is  no  picturesque  quality,  nothing  in 
the  workingman  but  what  suggests  a  hard, 
passionate  clash  between  the  classes ;  one  feels 
a  coming  revolution  of  the  proletariat,  but 
[385] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

its  expression  lacks  charm — it  is  suffering, 
hard,  sullen,  ugly." 

But  the  time  soon  came  when  I  could  hard- 
ly take  myself  away  from  Anton's  house  and 
friends.  Passion,  poetry,  warmth,  reality, 
intimacy;  frankness — a  thorough  acceptance 
of  human  attributes,  an  instinctive  way  of 
taking  life,  very  similar  to  that  of  the  great 
Walt  Whitman.  Other  people,  of  so-called 
"culture,"  I  felt  were  comparatively  anaemic 
and  of  a  piece.  The  workingmen  seemed 
more  intelligent  to  me  about  economic  mat- 
ters and  social  questions  than  university  stu- 
dents or  even  university  professors.  The 
ideas  I  heard  expressed  by  the  professional 
economists  or  sociologists,  by  the  reforming 
radical  politicians  or  philanthropists,  were 
put  with  more  convincingness  if  with  less 
rhetoric  in  the  circle  of  the  laboring  class.  It 
became  clearer  and  clearer  to  me  that  the 
origin  of  social  ideas  was  in  the  society  I  was 
then  frequenting. 

Even  superficial  culture,  many  of  these  peo- 
ple, particularly  those  who  have  become  out 
and  out  anti-social,  and  quitting  work,  have 
been  able  to  devote  themselves  to  the  phrase — 
people  like  Marie  and  Terry — have  in  a 
[386] 


Their  Points  of  View. 

marked  degree.  I  shall  try  to  record  a  more 
or  less  typical  conversation  of  the  more  or 
less  "cultured"  kind  which  took  place  one  day 
at  Anton's  house,  at  dinner  and  after,  when 
there  were  as  guests,  besides  myself,  Marie 
and  Terry,  Jay  and  Esther,  the  Poet's  wife, 
Schmidtty  and  his  sister,  a  robust  working 
girl  of  the  more  or  less  conservative  kind. 

"Esther,"  I  said,  "you  are  a  beautiful 
woman." 

These  women  do  not  understand  or  want 
compliments  which  do  not  go  to  the  soul. 
Esther  did  not  enjoy  my  remark,  which  was 
sincere,  and  she  said: 

"I  only  care  for  feeling,  for  the  inside." 
Esther  is  so  serious  and  sentimental  that  An- 
ton, who  always  fights  away  from  the  expres- 
sion of  intense  feeling,  said,  as  a  diversion : 

"Here's  to  man's  freedom  and  woman's 
slavery.  We  were  perhaps  economically 
wrong  in  making  women  slaves  to  begin  with, 
for  that  put  them  in  a  position  where  they 
can  deal  men  horrible  blows.  The  man  feels 
the  woman  is  his  property,  and  so  the  woman, 
if  she  wants,  can  injure  him  in  his  property 
feeling  and  his  sentimental  feeling  at  the  same 
time.  It  is  the  punishment  of  the  autocrat. 
[387] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

But  now  we've  got  them  there,  we  must  keep 
them  there  to  a  certain  extent.  For  the  most 
destructive  thing  a  man  can  do  is  to  take  a 
woman  seriously  and  put  her  on  an  equality. 
She  is  not  capable  of  it." 

"You're  talking  through  your  hat,  Anton," 
said  Maggie.  "You  know  you  don't  believe 
a  word  of  all  that.  You  bet  you  take  me 
seriously.     If  you  didn't,  I'd  soon  make  you." 

"I  don't  blame  Esther,"  said  Jay,  "for  hav- 
ing such  a  high  ideal.  That  is  why  I  loved 
her.  To  be  happy  we  need  an  ideal.  That 
is  why  in  some  ways  the  laboring  class  to-day 
is  so  unfortunate.  Not  only  is  the  material 
result  of  our  labor  taken  away  from  us,  but 
also  the  ideal  of  work.  We  must  seek  our 
ideal  outside  of  our  labor  and  that  is  why 
some  of  us  are  anarchists  and  some  trades- 
unionists,  some  free-lovers  and  some  Social- 
ists. The  employers  have  an  ideal  of  work, 
and  that  takes  away  from  them  the  need  of 
other  ideals. 

"You  anarchists  make  me  sick,"  said  Anton, 
aggressively.  He  was  sitting  in  his  flannel 
shirt,  with  his  collar  ofif,  and  shoving  down 
Maggie's  well-cooked  food  with  great  speed. 
"You  are  all  fanatics,  crazy  about  something. 
[388] 


Their  Points  of  View. 

Esther  and  Marie  are  crazy  about  Variety,' 
Terry  is  crazy  about  class-consciousness,  and 
about  what  he  calls  consistency;  the  Poet  is 
crazy  with  egotism,  Hapgood  is  crazy  to  butt 
into  what  doesn't  concern  him,  and  Maggie 
is  crazy  about  monogamy." 

"Guess  again,"  said  Maggie. 

"To  show  how  crazy  the  anarchists  are," 
continued  Anton,  ignoring  Maggie's  remark, 
"look  how  they  criticize  trades-unionism  with- 
out ever  going  to  the  meetings  and  not  know- 
ing or  caring  what's  being  done.  They  jump 
on  the  movement  as  hard  as  they  do  on  reli- 
gion or  capitalism." 

"Well,"  said  Terry,  "at  the  best,  trades- 
unionism  is  only  a  makeshift,  an  amelioration 
of  conditions,  and  is  not  ideal.  Besides,  it 
is  bourgeois,  middle-class.  Take  your  worthy 
President,  Gompers,  who  could  be  more  bour- 
geois than  Gompers?" 

"Yes,"  replied  Anton,  "Gompers  is  a  side- 
stepper,  I  must  admit.  But  it  is  better  than 
having  always  a  panacea  that  doesn't  work. 
At  the  anti-trust  meeting  the  other  day,  they 
all  had  their  panaceas,  Jane  Addams,  George 
Schilling,  Tucker — all  but  Gompers  and  he 
in  his  speech  again  showed  how  clever  he  is 
[389] 


Their  Points  of  View. 

in  saying  nothing,  in  stepping  aside.  But, 
after  all,  we  must  compromise,  to  get  any- 
thing. If  we  all  were  as  fanatical  as  the  an- 
archists, there  would  be  nothing  but  hot  air 
in  the  world." 

"You  talk  about  stupid  things,"  said  Marie, 
"just  as  if  there  were  no  women  present. 
Let's  talk  about  love.  By  the  way,  I  didn't 
realize  how  interesting  little  Sadie  is.  But 
the  other  night,  when  she  kissed  me  good-bye 
after  the  meeting,  I  saw  there  was  something 
in  her.  Her  kiss  filled  me  with  surprise  and 
emotion." 

"You  are  about  the  craziest  in  the  whole 
bunch,"  remonstrated  Anton. 

But  Marie  had  determined  the  topic  for*  a 
time,  and  they  talked  about  love  between  the 
sexes  with  a  downrightness  and  a  frankness 
and  at  the  same  time  a  knowledge  of  the  emo- 
tional facts  which  made  me  feel  that  I  was 
associating  with  people  who  at  least  were  civi- 
lized, and  not  over-civilized.  They  had 
sprung  into  emotional  maturity  without  the 
intermediate  processes  of  physical  degenera- 
tion which  are  often  an  accompaniment.  The 
fact  that  they  belonged  to  the  working  class 
was  a  sweet  preservative  against  the  pale 
[390] 


Their  Points  of  View. 

anaemia  of  emotional  freedom  which  one  is 
likely  to  find  in  other  sets. 

Towards  the  end  of  the  long  dinner,  Anton 
addressed  me,  and  said: 

"You  have  been  with  us  now  a  couple  of 
months.  You  butted  in,  but  you  have  made 
yourself  welcome.  We  have  all  enjoyed  your 
intelligence,  and  I  particularly  have  enjoyed 
your  way  of  putting  things.  You  say  rough 
things  so  delicately  that  for  working  people 
it  is  quite  a  treat.  Let's  have  a  speech.  Tell 
Ub  what  you  think  about  the  labor  movement 
and  about  anarchism.  And  don't  imitate 
Sam  Gompers  and  side-step  all  over  the  room. 
It's  not  a  dance,  but  a  talk  we  want." 

It  was  a  large  order,  but  I  knew  that  I  was 
among  tolerant  friends,  so  I  said:       , 

"I  can  only  repeat  the  things  which  you  and 
your  friends  have  either  thought  or  felt  about 
the  movement  and  about  society.  Left  to  my- 
self or  to  books  I  should  never  have  had  any 
ideas  on  these  subjects.  Perhaps  you  won't 
recognize  yourselves  or  your  ideas  in  my 
words.  If  not,  it  is  only  because  of  my  man- 
ner of  expression.  What  I  say,  merely  inter- 
prets, in  my  opinion,  what  you  think,  and,  in 
[391] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

an  inadequate  way,  embodies  the  results  of 
your  thought  and  feeling. 

"As  I  have  often  told  you,  I  have  found 
Chicago  wonderfully  interesting.  Before  I 
became  absorbed  in  you,  I  saw  much  of  the 
settlement  workers,  of  the  'smart'  people,  the 
young  politicians  and  business  men,  the  jour- 
nalists and  the  university  professors.  And  I 
found  them  all  very  broad,  for  their  situation, 
very  tolerant.  There  seemed  to  me  a  wonder- 
ful feeling  of  democracy  throughout  the  city, 
a  lack  of  snobbishness  that  I  had  never  felt 
elsewhere. 

"This  was  interesting,  inspiring,  but  until 
I  came  in  contact  with  you,  I  did  not  know 
how  interesting  it  all  was.  It  is  you  who 
have  given  me  the  key  to  all  the  rest.  It  is 
the  man-in-the-stFeet,  the  common  man,  the 
working  man,  who  is  giving  tone  to  all  the 
rest  of  society.  It  is  your  ideas  that  they  are 
expressing.  It  is  your  sentiment  that  is  grad- 
ually affecting  all  classes.  It  is  your  philos- 
ophy that  is  affecting  the  old  philosophy, 
broadening  it,  giving  it  a  larger  human  basis. 

"Among  the  newer  and  better  politicians 
there  has  been  a  vital  reaction  against  the 
principle  of  special  privileges  so  nicely 
[392] 


Their  Points  of  View. 

worked  out  by  the  business  class.  The  last 
few  years  have  been  years  of  reform.  Behind 
this  reform  has  been  the  working  class.  Pres- 
sure from  beneath  has  forced  these  social  pal- 
liatives, such  as  the  insurance  investigations, 
trust  legislation,  etc.,  etc.  The  feeling  for 
municipal  ownership  has  amounted  almost  to 
a  religion.  The  back-bone  of  that  movement 
has  been  the  laboring  class.  The  President 
of  the  United  States  is  accused  by  the  reac- 
tionaries of  being  a  'radical,'  a  Socialist.  He 
is  a  politician,  and  he  would  never  have  been 
forced  into  a  semi-radical  attitude  had  it  not 
been  for  the  pressure  which  h^d  its  original 
impulse  in  the  working  class. 

"It  is  natural  that  the  source  of  radical 
thought  should  be  more  radical  than  the  re- 
sults on  the  established  machinery.  The  re- 
mark of  your  labor  leader,  Anton,  in  the  Pitts- 
burg Convention,  that  you  are  all  anarchists, 
has  some  truth.  There  are  very  few  anarch- 
ists like  Terry — fortunately — [Perhaps  that's 
true,  interjected  Terry,  smilingly]  but  I  find 
in  all  of  you  the  germs  of  a  feeling  against, 
if  I  may  so  put  it.  You  all  distrust,  more  or 
less,  the  present  legal  and  judicial  machinery, 
the  present  law,  the  present  morality.  You 
[393] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

all — those  who  think — believe  there  is  a  mo- 
rality higher  than  the  morality  embodied 
in  law.  For  instance,  the  law  'thou  shalt  not 
be  a  scab'  is  for  you  a  higher  morality  than 
the  law  against  'disorderly  conduct'  and  riot 
in  the  street. 

"This  element  of  anarchism,  therefore,  goes 
deep.  It  is  embodied  in  the  very  essence  of 
the  economic  and  social  situation.  I  believe, 
personally,  that  while  it  has  its  abuses,  it 
makes  for  good.  It  puts  into  organized  so- 
ciety a  distrust  of  itself,  disturbs  it,  and  leads 
to  reform,  in  self-defense.  It  can  never  be 
realized,  in  any  extreme  form — perhaps  it 
ought  not  to  be  realized — but  it  is  an  excellent 
tonic:  it  helps  to  keep  society  from  being  too 
smug,  too  routine,  too  unjust,  too  uninterest- 
ing. We  must,  in  all  advance,  have  a  destruc- 
tive element,  and  when  the  destructive  ele- 
ment is  based  upon  something  as  positive,  as 
warm  and  as  humane  as  the  labor  movement, 
it  deserves  sympathetic  attention. 

"In  the  course  of  my  life  I  have  had  one 
deeply  anarchical  experience.  As  a  student, 
I  thought  I  could  arrive,  by  the  study  of 
metaphysics,  to  a  knowledge  of  the  objects  of 
metaphysics — God,  immortality.  Free  Will, 
[394] 


Their  Points  of  View. 

etc.  But  after  reading  the  history  of  meta- 
physics I  found  that  no  metaphysician  ever  ar- 
rived at  the  specific  thing  he  was  aiming  at — 
no  one  ever  did  or  will  discover  the  unknow- 
able. At  the  same  time  that  I  arrived  at  this 
negative  conclusion,  my  human  experience  be-- 
came  richer.  I  realized  the  number  of  beau- 
tiful and  interesting  concrete  things  and  ex- 
periences there  are.  This  double  situation  re- 
sulted in  my  becoming  a  metaphysical  an- 
archist. With  it,  came  a  deeper  pleasure  in 
literature,  in  art,  in  people,  in  life.  It  seemed 
as  a  cock-tail  before  dinner:  it  made  things 
more  interesting. 

"This  desire  for  more  abundant  life,  more 
pleasure,  more  beauty,  more  understanding, 
is  at  the  basis  of  all  sincere  anarchical  feel- 
ing. The  great  poets  and  great  artists  and 
great  spiritual  seers  have  been  anarchical  in 
regard  to  old  forms  and  ideas  in  their  art; 
that  is,  they  have  had  an  element  of  anarch- 
ism; though  at  the  same  time  they  have  felt 
the  beauty  of  the  old. 

"So,  too,  is  love.    Those  anarchists  who  are 

free-lovers — sincerely  so,  for  among  those  are 

many   fakers — are   partly    right   and   partly 

wrong,  in  my  opinion.    A  husband  and  wife 

[395] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor, 

get  along  best  together  when  there  is  an  ele- 
ment of  uncertainty,  of  possible  change,  of 
growth ;  when  each  is  interested  in  some  other 
person  or  persons  of  the  opposite  sex.  If 
their  relation  is  the  best,  this  interest  in  others 
helps  them  to  be  more  interested  in  one  an- 
other, and  their  relation  toge*^her.  It  makes 
it  more  exciting,  more  rich.  ,. 

"Balance  seems  peculiarly  necessary  in  this 
relation.  Those  among  you  anarchists  who 
are  not  extremists  in  this  matter  seem  to  me 
to  get  the  most  out  of  this  side  of  life.  There 
is  a  monotony  in  too  much  freedom  that  is 
worse  than  the  monotony  of  too  much  con- 
servatism. The  ideal  is  to  have  one  deep  and 
overpowering  relation  to  which  all  others 
serve  as  stimulants  and  emotional  comments. 
One  of  your  anarchists  admitted  to  me  the 
other  day:  'Free-love  women  have  no  mys- 
tery. The  conservative  women  are  the  rich- 
est. Sin  is  a  luxury,  and  so  it  would  be  a 
pity  to  abolish  it.' 

"That  sentiment  is  really  immoral,  but  there 
is  a  moral  truth  at  the  bottom  of  it,  more 
ethically  expressed  by  Balzac,  than  by  your 
anarchist.     He  says: 

"  *It  is  an  immense  proof  of  inferiority  in  a 
[396] 


Their  Points  of  View. 

man  not  to  be  able  to  make  of  his  wife  his 
mistress.  Variety  in  love  is  a  sign  of  impo- 
tence. Constancy  will  always  be  the  genius 
of  love,  the  proof  of  an  immense  force,  which 
constitutes  the  poet.' 

"Anarchism  in  love  should  work  against  the 
too  stolid,  and  stupid  and  routine  institutional 
side,  not  against  ideals.  Then,  indeed,  an- 
archy is  bad.  If  it  tends  to  destroy  ideals, 
away  with  it.  But  I  feel  that  with  you  people 
the  true  function  of  anarchism  is  to  sustain 
and  keep  alive  the  ideal.  The  life  of  a  man 
like  Kropotkin — almost  a  saint — shows  this  to 
be  the  case,  for  his  life  is  like  that  of  many 
anarchists.     It  is  typical. 

"A  pathetic  and  amusing  and  absurd  thing 
is  the  ordinary  attitude  of  society,  everywhere 
except  in  England,  towards  the  avowed  an- 
archists. In  England,  they  are  left  alone,  and 
no  harm  is  done.  But  they  are  persecuted 
everjrwhere  else,  even  in  America,  and  yet,  if 
not  disturbed,  they  are  entirely  harmless. 
Anarchy,  indeed,  is  a  gentle  idealism,  though 
that  is  not  the  general  idea.  The  popular 
conception  of  an  anarchist  is  about  as  near  the 
truth  as  the  popular  conception  of  a  Jew  or 
of  a  witch.  But  when  I  met  the  anarchists 
[397] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

among  the  laboring  men  I  found  something 
unusually  gentle,  unusually  low-toned,  and 
with  an  avowed  and  actual  hatred  of  force. 
The  Socialists  are  like  bulls  in  comparison, 
and  the  police  and  capitalists  strong-arm  men. 

"Anarchism  begins  with  a  revolt  against 
economic  injustice,  but  it  ends  as  an  aesthetic 
ideal.  It  is  the  fine  art  of  the  proletariat.  In 
function,  it  is  stimulating,  an  attitude  of  mind. 
It  has  a  practical  side,  as  it  allows  a  man  to 
be  an  opportunist  in  life,  while  having  a  high 
ideal.  Of  this  kind  of  anarchist,  Clarence 
Darrow  is  the  most  prominent  among  you. 
It  emphasizes  individuality  and  the  rights  of 
the  soul,  as  against  convention  and  law.  In 
marriage,  it  fosters  insecurity  and  therefore 
love  and  interest.  It  is  a  remedy  against 
snobbishness,  as  it  renders  social  distinctions 
insecure.  Springing  from  the  people,  it  finds 
great  things  in  the  people. 

"Anarchism  is  something  like  the  Catholic 
Church.  It  is  tolerant  and  elastic,  and  in- 
cludes everything  except  intolerance,  and 
sometimes  even  that,  generally  that  with  the 
declared  anarchists,  who  after  all  are  not  the 
real  anarchists,  who  have  no  culte.  The  most 
perfect  anarchist  I  know  is  one  of  the  deans 
[398] 


Their  Points  of  View. 

of  a  university.  It  is  peculiarly  human  and 
makes  room  even  for  graft,  as  part  of  an  im- 
perfect system. 

"Although  anarchism  is  an  aesthetic  ideal, 
it  tends  to  become  fixed,  and  therefore  unaes- 
thetic.  Its  object  is  to  get  rid  of  prejudice 
and  the  routine  of  institutions,  but  it  often 
wrongly  tends  to  do  away  at  the  same  time 
with  the  beauty  there  is  in  institution,  such 
as  marriage,  forms  of  literature,  history  and 
art.  I  find  in  many  of  you — not  indeed  in  the 
most  self-conscious — a  hatred  of  poetry,  fairy 
tales,  history,  a  hatred  of  whatever  conserva- 
tive people  like,  irrespective  of  whether  it  is 
good  or  evil.  This  is  the  point  where  anarch- 
ism itself  becomes  routine,  founded  on  narrow 
laziness  of  mind,  and  needing  itself  to  be  re- 
formed." 

"You  express  pretty  well,"  commented 
Terry,  "Kropotkin's  idea  of  anarchism,  a  gen- 
tle sweet  sort.  There  is  another  kind,  how- 
ever, a  more  egotistic  one,  that  is  Tucker's 
way,  and  mine.  Anarchism  is  dangerous, 
even  when  bombs  don't  come  in.  It  does  tend 
to  destroy  the  beautiful  stability  and  tran- 
quillity of  the  bourgeois  citizen,  and  if  real- 
ized would  do  harm ;  but  the  harm  would  be 
[399] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

very  slight  in  comparison  with  the  harm  of 
the  present  state  of  things." 

"AH  this  kind  of  talk,"  said  Anton,  "would 
be  tommyrot,  if  it  were  not  for  one  thing. 
The  important  feature  of  it  all  is,  as  Hapgood 
says,  that  it  is  based  on  the  Labor  Movement. 
It  is  a  warning  to  the  world  that  the  condi- 
tions under  which  workingmen  live  tend  to 
bring  about  certain  ideas.  And  yet  damn 
fools  like  you,  Terry,  sneer  at  the  labor  move- 
ment, when  there  wouldn't  be  any  anarchists, 
if  it  were  not  for  the  labor  movement." 

But  Marie  and  Esther  and  Maggie  were 
getting  nervous,  so  they  brought  the  talk 
around  again  to  Subject  Number  One. 


[400] 


CHAPTER  XVIII. 

A  Ripe  Letter. 

The  time  for  me  to  leave  Chicago  came 
around,  and  it  was  with  a  heavy  heart  and  a 
feeling  of  moral  wrong  that  I  realized  the 
way  things  conflict  in  this  world.  My  fare- 
well evening  at  Anton's  was  as  interesting  as 
ever,  though  the  coming  separation  gave  it 
a  touch  of  gloom.  When  I  arrived  that  even- 
ing, Anton  was  telling  his  son  about  some  of 
his  hobo  experiences — how  he  swung  along 
the  Grand  Canon  on  the  trucks  of  a  passenger 
train.  Schmidtty  was  there,  and  noticed  in 
Anton  a  certain  lack  of  mechanical  observa- 
tion, the  thing  that  had  made  it  so  difficult 
for  Anton  to  learn  his  trade:  he  had  done  it 
by  sheer  force  of  will  and  energy.  Yet  pri- 
marily, he  is  a  liver,  an  expresser,  and  a  phi- 
losopher. 

He  spoke,  at  this  last  meeting,  more  seri- 
ously than  usual,  about  things  connected  with 
[401] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

the  labor  situation,  marriage  and  work.  "No 
one  can  help  the  men,"  he  said,  "except  they 
themselves.  It  is  hopeless  from  the  outside, 
and  difficult  from  the  inside.  Education  is 
the  great  thing,  not  necessarily  from  books. 
Tom  Morgan,  who  for  so  long  was  prominent 
in  the  movement  and  afterwards  as  a  Socialist, 
got  his  mental  start  from  copying  architec- 
tural designs  while  working  at  his  trade. 
There  are  many  roads,  but  few  results. 

"I  have  enjoyed  you  and  your  intelligence 
and  your  way  of  saying  things.  You  repre- 
sent, in  a  way,  another  class,  and  that,  too,  I 
feel,  has  broadened  me." 

I  explained,  with  even  more  sincerity,  how 
he  had  pleased  and  influenced  me.  Maggie 
said  very  little,  but  all  these  meetings  in  which 
there  had  been  so  much  free  talk,  so  much  en- 
joyment and  so  much  sympathy,  had  meant 
much  to  her,  as  her  tears  showed.  We  talked 
about  marriage,  and  the  great  pleasure  there 
is  in  utter  frankness  and  honesty  in  life.  The 
latter  part  of  the  evening,  we  three  were  alone 
together:  I,  who  had  never  worked  with  my 
hands  in  my  life,  much  universitied,  much  be- 
cultured  so  to  speak;  he,  a  woodworker,  a 
former  tramp  and  she  a  workingman's  wife, 
[402  ] 


A  Ripe  Letter. 

who  took  in  washing  and  was,  as  far  as  "class" 
went,  a  most  simple  girl  of  German  origin.  I 
am  forced  to  remember  these  distinctions  and 
differences  now,  for  the  purpose  of  this  social 
study  that  I  have  made.  But  I  felt  no  social 
or  intellectual  difference  between  us,  essen- 
tially, at  the  time,  or  now.  In  them  I  knew 
I  had  met  my  equals  at  least;  in  some  ways 
my  superiors,  people  whom  I  could  love,  and 
as  I  went  away  that  evening  I  reflected  sadly 
on  the  baseless  character  of  snobbishness  and 
the  fundamental  cruelty  and  meaninglessness 
of  class. 

After  I  had  been  some  weeks  in  New  York, 
I  received  from  Anton  a  letter  about  Labor 
politics  and  also  some  sentiments  about  min- 
isters, interesting  as  showing  greater  tolerance 
towards  these  persons  than  he  was  able  to 
show  formerly.  ~ 

"I  need  not  go  into  details  in  my  excuse 
for  not  writing,  for  you  are  onto  my  game. 
Maggie  is  out  to-night  for  a  good  time,  so  I 
am  alone  with  the  little  ones,  and  as  I  feel 
at  best,  I  thought  I  would  drop  you  a  few 
lines.  I  had  a  good  report  to  the  Federation, 
and  they  had  it  printed  with  my  picture.  We 
had  another  election  in  the  Federation  Sun- 
[403] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

day.  I  was  one  of  the  judges  and  Madden's 
gang  was  put  down  and  out.  They  had  a 
report  around  town  that  I  was  to  be  Mad- 
den's  candidate  for  President.  You  can  bet 
it  made  me  hot  under  the  collar. 

"So  on  the  day  of  nomination,  my  name  was 
presented  as  a  candidate  for  President.  John 
Fitzpatrick  and  John  Levine  were  also  candi- 
dates. I  arose  to  the  occasion  and  declared 
in  open  meeting  that  the  report  of  my  being 
Madden's  candidate  was  a  damned  lie,  that 
I  declined  in  favor  of  Fitzpatrick,  and  would 
always  remain  a  clean-cut  trade-unionist  with- 
out any  political  intrigue.  You  can  bet  I  was 
cheered  all  over  the  hall.  But  I  made  the 
Madden  gang  good  and  sore,  as  I  gave  them 
hell  right  on  the  floor.  At  the  election,  about 
1 20  policemen  were  present.  I  and  many 
others  dislike  very  much  to  have  the  police 
in  our  Union  affairs,  but  we  could  not  help 
it,  as  we  did  not  want  a  repetition  of  the  Don- 
nelly's slugging. 

"You  remember  my  telling  you  about  Fitz- 
patrick working  against  me  when  I  was 
elected  delegate  to  Pittsburg.  He  got  up  in 
the  meeting,  you  remember,  and  made  a 
speech  in  favor  of  the  other  fellow.  Well, 
[404] 


'A  Ripe  Letter. 

my  time  came,  and  I  made  a  speech  in  his 
favor  and  when  the  votes  were  counted,  and 
he  was  elected,  I  went  to  him,  gave  him  my 
hand,  and  told  him  I  was  ready  to  assist  him 
with  all  my  power  (if  I  had  any)  to  conduct 
a  clean  administration.  I  wish  you  could 
have  seen  his  face.  It  was  a  case  of  my  being 
a  Christian  and  returning  good  for  evil.  And 
while  he  is  a  strong,  robust  man,  not  very  sen- 
timental, the  tears  rolled  down  his  face,  and 
he  asked  me  to  overlook  his  mistake,  in  his 
misjudgment  of  me.  I  was  pleasantly  af- 
fected and  told  him  he  could  rest  assured  that 
my  love  for  this  great  labor  movement  was 
strong  enough  to  overcome  the  desire  for  re- 
taliation, when  such  action  would  tend  to 
check  the  progress  of  our  movement.  *I  trust 
and  hope,'  I  said,  'that  your  talent  and  ability 
will  at  all  times  be  used  in  the  cause  of  the 
proletariat' 

"I  expect  that  Madden  will  lie  down  now 
and  admit  his  defeat.  Out  of  a  total  of  635 
votes  cast,  Fitzpatrick  received  396  and  John 
Levine,  Madden's  man,  196.  This  was  in 
spite  of  the  fact  that  Madden  had  been  able 
to  induce  some  unions,  among  them  several 
of  the  teamsters'  unions,  and  all  the  unafEli- 
[405] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

ated  bricklayers  unions,  to  join  the  Federation 
just  before  the  election ;  and  besides  had  got- 
ten out  phony  cards,  which  we  did  not  dis- 
cover at  first.  But  as  soon  as  we  noticed  the 
illegal  cards  we  put  a  damper  on  them. 
Some  men  came  to  vote  on  bricklayers'  cards, 
but  as  they  looked  about  as  much  like  brick- 
layers as  the  Anarchist  Poet  looks  like  a  sewer 
digger,  they  were  challenged,  and  when  it  was 
found  they  did  not  know  the  address  of  the 
man  whose  name  appeared  on  their  card,  they 
were  promptly  denied  the  right  to  vote.  In 
one  case,  a  teamster  came  up  to  vote  with  a 
card  which  bore  the  name  of  a  delegate  from 
the  cement  finishers'  union.  The  tally 
showed  that  the  cement  finisher  had  already 
voted. 

"We  refused  to  let  him  vote.  He  left  the 
hall,  but  returned  with  Jerry  McCarthy,  Pres- 
ident of  the  Truck  Drivers'  Union,  who  vigor- 
ously protested.  He  made  an  attack  upon 
Nockels,  and  the  police  immediately  threw 
him  out,  and  also  the  other  teamster.  Out- 
side of  this  little  fray  there  was  no  sign  of 
violence. 

"I  don't  know  if  they  will  repeat  these 
methods  six  months  hence,  but  the  feeling  is 
[406] 


A  Ripe  Letter. 

so  strong  against  Madden  that  it  is  difficult 
for  one  to  conceive  how  they  can  be  foolish 
enough  to  continue  in  their  bulldozing  tac- 
tics. Yet  we  must  expect  very  strenuous  ef- 
forts on  the  part  of  the  grafter  to  maintain 
his  power,  when  it  is  slowly  waning.  You 
may  expect  sarcasm  and  criticism  from  him 
in  one  direction  and  pleading  with  crocodile 
tears  in  the  direction  where  there  appears  to 
be  a  faint  hope  of  deception.  But  when  his 
power  is  lost,  it  makes  very  little  difference 
whether  it  be  in  the  political  arena,  or  on  the 
economic  battle-field,  there  remains  nothing 
for  him  to  do  but  to  use  bulldozing  methods 
in  the  hope  that  the  honest  man  may  fear  him. 
In  the  grafter's  feelings  there  is  not  the  slight- 
est conception  of  morality.  His  first,  last, 
and  only  object,  is  to  regain  his  lost  power, 
and  in  the  action  of  the  grafter,  the  old  say- 
ing, the  end  justifies  the  means,  is  typical  in 
its  conception. 

"I  am  pleased,  however,  that  with  the  cen- 
tralization of  capital,  the  awakening  of  the 
public  conscience  becomes  greater  and 
greater.  This  is  especially  true  in  the  organ- 
ized Labor  Movement,  and  I  look  forward 
with  more  and  more  hope  that  the  near  fu- 
[407] 


The  Spirit  of  Labor. 

ture  will  show  clearly  the  necessity  of  remov- 
ing a  system  that  affords  the  opportunity  for 
the  cunning-minded  to  accumulate  not  only 
millions,  but  billions,  on  the  one  hand,  and 
that  deprives  honest  efforts  in  millions  of 
cases  from  the  just  results,  on  the  other  hand. 

"I  feel  extremely  thankful  that  a  man  like 
T.  Lawson  has  revealed  himself  to  the  world 
and  has  made  the  opportunity  more  favorable 
for  the  little  agitators  like  myself,  and  thou- 
sands of  others.  To  point  out,  and  leave,  a 
lasting  impression  on  the  minds  of  the  people 
as  to  the  sweeping  injustice  of  this  condition : 
this  is  a  great  thing.  I  hope  the  political 
arena  will  produce  more  Jeromes,  and  Folks 
and  Johnsons,  who  although  their  philosophy 
seems  to  me  superficial  or  nothing,  and  their 
minds  not  very  deep,  yet  are  good  men  in  ac- 
tion, and  the  kind  we  need.  They  possess  the 
courage  necessary  to  challenge  the  audacity 
of  the  grafter  and  the  ignorance  of  the  parti- 
san voter,  in  which  ignorance  rests  the  real 
strength  of  the  machine.  If  we  could  have 
one  thousand  such  men,  there  would  be  'some- 
thing doing.* 

"You  will  perhaps  be  surprised  when  I  tell 
you  that  I  was  invited  to  speak  at  the  Olivet 
[408] 


^A  Ripe  Letter. 

Church.  I  accepted  an  invitation  to  dine 
with  the  minister.  I  assure  you  that  I  had  an 
interesting  talk  with  him.  You  may  laugh, 
but  it  is  true.  He  is  a  communist,  as  far  as 
the  ideal  is  concerned,  and  in  practice  an  op- 
portunist, but  a  man  who  is  willing  to  work 
for  the  great  army  of  humanity  who  need  all 
the  best  things  of  life.  I  spoke  on  trades- 
unionism.  They  appeared  well  satisfied  with 
my  talk,  and  urged  me  to  speak  on  the  tramp, 
at  another  occasion.  I  don't  know  what  your 
opinion  will  be  of  this  incident  (and  to  be 
frank,  I  don't  care),  whether  I  am  going  to 
the  bad,  or  whether  the  ministers  are  im- 
proving. 

"This  is  all  I  have  to  describe,  since  you 
went  away.  I  might  add  that  you  have  left 
a  good  impression  on  our  friends  and  that  we 
miss  you  very  much.  I  am  just  at  present 
pacing  the  floor  on  Sunday  morning  (having 
begun  this  letter  last  night)  and  my  dear 
monogamic  wife  is  making  this  stenographic 
report.  Maggie  says  there  isn't  any  use  in 
sending  her  love,  as  you  have  taken  away 
more  already  than  you  have  kept,  but  I 
know  that  you,  having  been  in  Japan  and 
many  other  places,  have  the  capacity  for  con- 
[409] 


A  Ripe  Letter. 

serving  good  things.     I   remain,  yours,   for 
Truth,  Liberty  and  Justice, 

"Anton." 

On  this  note  of  good-citizenship  and  social 
playfulness,  I  let  my  dear  friend  rest,  and  put 
before  the  public  his  spirit — the  spirit  of  the 
alive  and  progressive  American  workingman 
of  the  present  day. 


[410] 


Th 


e 


Autobiography  of  a  Thief 

A  true  story  of  the  life  of  a  criminal 
taken  down  and  edited  by  Mr.  Hapgood. 

Cloth.       349  pp.        $1.25  postpaid. 


COMMENTS  OF  THE  CRITICS 

"  The  book  as  a  whole  impresses  the  reader  as  an  accurate  presenta- 
tion of  the  thief's  personal  point  of  view,  a  vivid  picture  of  the  society 
in  which  he  lived  and  robbed  and  of  the  influences,  moral  and  political, 
by  which  he  was  surrounded.  The  story  indeed  has_  something^  of  the 
quality  of  Defoe's  'Colonel  Jacque';  it  is  filled  with  convincing  de- 
tails."—  New  York  Evening  Post. 

"  To  one  reader  at  least  —  one  weary  reader  of  many  books  which 
seem  for  the  most  part  '  flat,  stale  and  unprofitable ' —  this  is  a  book 
that  seems  eminently  '  worth  while.'  Indeed,  every  word  of  the  book, 
from  cover  to  cover,  is  supremely,  vitally  interesting.  Most  novels  are 
tame  beside  it,  and  few  recent  books  or  any  kind  are  so  rich  in  sug- 
gestiveness." —  Interior. 

"  What  is  the  value  of  such  an  autobiography  of  a  thief  as  Mr. 
Hapgood  has  given  us?  It  is  this.  Professional  crime  is  one  of  the 
overprosperous  branches  of  industry  in  our  large  cities.  As  a  nation 
we  are  casting  around  for  means  to  check  it,  or,  in  other  words,  to 
divert  the  activities  of  the  professional  criminals  into  some  other  in- 
dustry in  which  these  men  can  satisfy  their  peculiar  talents  and  at 
the  same  time  ^et  a  living  with  less  inconvenience  to  the  mass  of 
citizens.  The  criminal,  being  as  much  a  human  being  as  the  rest  of 
us,  must  be  known  as  he  is  before  we  can  either  influence  him  per- 
sonally or  legislate  for  him  effectually.  If  we  treat  him  as  we  would 
the  little  girl  who  stole  her  brother's  candy  mice  or  as  the  man  who 
under  great  stress  of  temptation  yields  to  the  impulse  to  steal  against 
his  struggling  will,  we  will  fail,  for  we  overlook  the  very  essence  of 
the  matter  —  his  professionalism.  It  is  safe  to  say  that  perusal  of 
Mr.  Hapgood's  book  will  help  many  a  student  of  criminology  to  find 
his  way  through  the  current  tangle  of  statistics,  reform  plans,  analyses 
of  '  graft '  and  what  not,  by  the  very  light  of  humanity  that  is  in 
it." —  Chicago  Record-Herald. 

"  The  manner  and  style  of  '  The  Autobiography  of  a  Thief '  is  that 
which  attracts  even  the  fastidious  lovers  of  literature.  It  is  the  life- 
story  of  a  real  thief  unmistakably  impressive  in  its  force  and  truth.  As 
a  matter  of  course,  the  book  is  on  the  hinge  of  a  novel,  but  it  contains 
the  gem  and  sparkle  of  genuineness  and  its  complication  has  the  flavor 
of  accuracy." — New  Orleans  Item. 


"  It  is  not  only  a  powerful  plea  for  the  reform  of  abuses  in  our 
penitentiaries,  but  it  is  an  extraordinary  revelation  of  the  life  of  a 
criminal  from  his  birth  up,  and  an  explanation  of  the  conditions  which 
impelled    him    first    to    crime    and    later    to    attempted    reformation." — 

New  York  Herald. 

"  The  truth  found  in  '  The_  Autobiog^raphy  of  a  Thief  '  is  not  only 
stranger  but  far  more  interesting  than  much  of  the  present  day  fiction. 
The  autobiography  of  '  Light-fingered  Jim  '  is  absorbing,  in  many  pages 
startling,  in  its  graphicness.  ...  In  spite  of  its  naturalness,  daring 
and  directness,  the  work  has  a  marked  literary  style  —  a  finish  that 
could  not  have  been  given  by  an  unexperienced  hand.  But  this  adds 
to  rather  than  detracts  from  the  charm  of  the  book." —  Philadelphia 
Public  Ledger. 

"  No  more  realistic  book  has  been  written  for  a  long  time  than 
Hutchins  Hapgood's  '  The  Autobiography  of  _  a  Thief.'  No  books  on 
criminology  and  no  statistics  regarding  penal  institutions  can  carry  the 
weight   of   truth  and  conviction   which   this  autobiography  conveys." — 

Chicago  Chronicle. 

"  As  a  study  in  sociology  it  is  splendid ;  as  a  human  story  it  will 
hold  attention,   every  page  of  it." —  Nashville  American. 

"  It  is  a  clear  and  g^raphic  insight  into  the  lives  of  the  lower  world 
and  is  written  with  impressive  force.  It  is  a  remarkable  addition  to 
the  literature  of  the  season." —  Grand  Rapids  Herald, 

"  An  illuminating  and  truly  instructive  book,  and  one  of  terrible 
fascination." —  Christian  Endeavor   World. 

"  As  a  contribution  to  the  study  of  sociology  as  illustrated  from  life 
and  not  from  mere  text-books,  the  story  recorded  by  Mr.  Hapgood 
will  be   welcomed   by   all  philanthropic  people." —  New   York   Observer. 

"  It  is  an  absorbing  story  of  the  making  of  a  criminal,  and  is  rightly 
classed  by  the  publishers  as  a  '  human  document.'  It  is  absorbing  alike 
to  the  reader  who  reads  for  the  diversion  of  reading  and  to  those  who 
are  really  thoughtful  students  of  the  forces  which  are  working  in  the 
life  round  about  them." —  Brooklyn  Life. 

"  Those  in  whom  the  sense  of  human  oneness  and  social  responsi- 
bility is  strong  will  be  intensely  interested  in  these  genuine  experiences 
and  in  the  naive,  if  perverted,  viewpoint  of  a  pick-pocket,  thief  and 
burglar  who  has  served  three  terms  in  State's  prison." —  Booklovers' 
Library. 

"  It  may  be  that  '  Jim  '  puts  things  strongly  sometimes,  but  the  spirit 
of  truth  at  least  is  plain  in  every  chapter  of  the  book.  That,  in  gen- 
eral, it  is  the  real  thing  is  the  feeling  the  reader  has  after  he  has 
finished  with  '  The  Autobiography  of  a  Thief.'  It  is  not  a  pleasant 
book;  it  is  anything  but  a  book  such  as  '  the  young  person  should  re- 
ceive as  a  birthday  gift.  It  w  a  book  however  which  the  man  anxious 
to  keep  track  of  life  in  this  country  should  read  and  ponder  over. — 

JosiAH  Flynt.  in  the  Bookman. 

DUFFIELDraCOMBW 

36EAST2PST.^K^NEW  YORK 


DATE  DUE 


1 

J 

GAYLORD 

PRINTED  IN  U.S.A. 

WRY  FACILITY 


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